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About two years after foreign law enforcement agencies slammed punitive fines in the US and Germany on Siemens for bribing officials of foreign countries – including Nigeria – to secure contracts, no Nigerian has been prosecuted.

As
Nigerian law enforcement agencies engage in what appears to be an
everlasting investigation of government officials indicted abroad for
corruption, one country, the United States, is busy raking in massive
revenue on account of Nigeria’s dereliction.

Nigeria’s bribery
misfortune has so far generated over N300 billion (approximately $2
billion) in revenue for the United States government, from fines it
imposed on companies which bribed Nigerian officials to corner
government contracts. Our analysis of the three current major
international bribery scandals (Siemens, Halliburton/TSKJ, Daimler)
involving Nigerian officials, indicates no traction or indictment from
the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), the agency that
leads investigations relating to economic and financial crimes.

This
finding also coincides with the release of a business survey on crime
and corruption in our country, which indicates that Nigerians have
“little trust in anti-corruption authorities.”

The report is a
collaboration between the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), the
Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), the European Union
(EU), and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).

“It
is hard to have any confidence in these agencies, and all these endless
investigations point at nothing but a case of dereliction, and probably
collaboration, or both,” said Jiti Ogunye, a leading public interest
lawyer in Lagos, who wondered angrily “how come that 19 years after
Siemens, (the Germany-based multinational electrical firm) agreed to
pay fines to both the US and German authorities for bribing officials
of foreign countries – including Nigeria – to secure contracts, no
Nigerian has been prosecuted?”

Another attorney, Abuja-based Charles
Musa, said if the US government is fining its own citizens, and its
companies, it is unfortunate that Nigeria, where all the bribery took
place, be it Anammco or Halliburton, is just grandstanding and playing
to the gallery, and not serious about prosecuting its citizens.

“In
a proper country, those companies should have been fined themselves,
and they’ll be blacklisted. It’s unfortunate that we don’t have the
political will to prosecute any crime in this country as long as it
doesn’t involve a poor man. These people are well known, they (their
names) are on the Internet, they are in US court papers, and nothing
has happened to them. It is unfortunate,” he said.

US revenue

The
revenue made by the United States represents fines paid by bribe
givers: Siemens, Kellogg Brown & Root, Technip and Daimler AG, to
the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the Department of
Justice in settlement agreements, for giving kickbacks to Nigerian
officials in exchange for multibillion dollar contracts. And by the
time investigations are completed in the $182 million Halliburton
bribery scandal, which has so far yielded $917 million dollars for the
U.S. government, the country is likely to rake in an additional N68
billion (approximately $449million) in fines from a former Halliburton
executive Albert Jackson Stanley, two United Kingdom citizens, Jeffrey
Tesler and Wojciech Chodan, and ENI of France, a member of the infamous
TSKJ consortium.

Already, Mr Stanley has been sentenced to seven
years in jail and he is to pay $10.8 million in restitution. Tesler and
Chodan, who allegedly coordinated the elaborate bribery scheme on
behalf of the TSKJ consortium, have also been indicted by a federal
grand jury in Houston and might forfeit $132 million to the American
government.

Investigations into ENI’s involvement in the bribery
scheme is still ongoing but in anticipation of its indictment, the
company has already set aside 250 million euro, an amount it plans to
deploy in a settlement agreement with the SEC and the Department of
Justice.

America has accused the company of violating its Foreign
Corrupt Practices Act, which forbids “certain classes of persons and
entities to make payments to foreign government officials to assist in
obtaining or retaining business.”

Unwilling Nigeria

But
while the U.S. is prosecuting its citizens involved in the scams and
compelling concerned companies to pay huge fines, Nigeria, where the
offences were committed and whose citizens received the bribes, has
failed to properly investigate the cases and punish those involved.

“What
that means is that Nigerian laws and institutions are not working and
we are paying dearly for that,” said Bunmi Aborisade, an adjunct
professor at the State University of New York. “If those fines had been
paid to our country, it would have gone a long way in alleviating
poverty among our people. But that is even if the fine proceeds are not
stolen again.”

Siemens was the first to enter into a settlement
agreement with the SEC and the American justice department. On December
12, 2008, in a charge brought against it in a US District Court for the
District of Columbia, the German company agreed to pay $350 million in
disgorgement to SEC and a $450 million criminal fine to the justice
department.

The company had earlier paid fines of 395 million Euro
(approximately $569 million) and 201 million Euro(approximately $285
million) to the office of the Prosecutor-General in Munich, Germany,
over the same charge that it bribed Nigerian officials to corner four
telecommunication contracts.

When Siemens first entered into these
plea agreements, the Nigerian government blacklisted it and suspended
it from handling government contracts. But the Umaru Yar’Adua
administration soon lifted the suspension, saying the company had
repented. The company did not pay any fine and nobody was prosecuted
for the crime.

Two months later, in February 2009, Kellog Brown and
Root parted with $177 million and $402 million in payments it made to
SEC and the department of justice for its role in the bribing of
top-level Nigerian officials in exchange for the contract to build our
$6 billion Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas plant.

The two U.S.
agencies then went after German automaker, Daimler, and got it to cough
out a total $185 million in fines to settle charges that it compromised
Nigerian officials to award several vehicle supply contracts to it.

With
the announcement on Monday that Technip, a member of the TSKJ
consortium, had agreed to pay $338 million for its role in the bribery
of Nigerian officials, America’s total earning from enforcement
proceedings in the $182 million Halliburton bribery scam alone now
stands at $917 million (approximately N138 billion).

“The
resolutions announced today demonstrate once again the department’s
commitment to aggressively investigate and prosecute international
bribery by U.S. and foreign corporations alike,” the justice
department’s Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Mythili
Raman, said in a statement. “The fact that Technip now must pay
criminal penalties and civil disgorgement totalling $338 million should
make clear that, in the end, bribery of foreign officials will have
consequences.”

Not finished

Yet the Americans
are not finished. ENI, another member of the TSKJ consortium, is being
investigated and both SEC and the Justice department are likely to file
separate charges against the company before long. The fourth member of
the TSKJ Consortium, JGC Corporation of Japan, may, however, escape
U.S. sanctions because it is not listed in the New York Stock Exchange.
It is listed in the Tokyo Stock Exchange.

The U.S. authorities said
it was determined to bring to book all those involved in bribing
foreign officials in exchange for business favours.

“The FBI is
committed to pursuing those who disrupt the level playing field to
which companies in the U.S. and around the world are entitled,” said
FBI Assistant Director Kevin L. Perkins. “This case (Technip’s)
demonstrates the FBI’s commitment to aggressively investigate
violations of this law. We will continue to investigate FCPA matters by
working in partnership with other law enforcement agencies, both
foreign and domestic, to ensure that both corporations and executives
who bribe foreign officials in return for lucrative business contracts
are punished.” Analysts say while America’s FBI and SEC are matching
words with action, Nigeria’s EFCC, responsible for the Nigerian end of
the investigation, is running round in circles and barking without
biting.

Not lifting a finger

“It is quite
unfortunate and pathetic that foreign countries have brought to justice
those who have engaged in bribery while doing businesses in Nigeria,
while Nigeria, the victim of these corrupt practices, has not lifted a
finger in such despicable acts against the country,” said Bukola
Oreofe, executive director, Nigeria Liberty Democratic Forum, a New
York-based pro-democracy group.

“One can only leave to the
imagination the number of schools, hospitals, roads, agricultural
development, avoidable deaths that would have been averted if Nigeria
had been protected from this fleecing or if the country, through her
own criminal statutes, could bring the local and foreign perpetrators
to justice.

“If the United States can earn millions from such punishment, it is sad that Nigeria looks the other way,” Oreofe said.

Idris Akinbajo and Elor Nkereuwem contributed to this report.

The law enforcement crises that
has followed the marriage between Ahmed Yerima, a 49-year-old senator,
to a 13-year-old Egyptian girl, has bolstered the cases of paedophilia
in Nigeria, child rights activists have said.

The activists, who gathered at
Abuja during the week for a support dinner for the Global Association
of Women Attorneys (GAFA), identified the inability of the attorney
general of the federation and the inspector general of police to
prosecute Mr Yerima for breaking a child rights law, as an
encouragement for gender-based violence.

“Though there is little statistics
to document the trend, there is no gainsaying that both at the home
front and in the workplace, the female gender has had her psych
adversely affected by this assault,” Chinelo Irele, President of the
GAFA said.

“Law enforcement in this regard
has been less than satisfactory, owing in part to factors of tradition,
religion, and economic disempowerment.”

The GAFA had led a group of other
women organizations to the National Assembly to protest Mr Yerima’s
marriage to his Egyptian driver’s 13-year-old child, at the wake of the
marriage which was contracted in the national mosque early this year.

Chidi Odinkalu, the director of
Africa Program Open Society Justice Initiative, who was a guest speaker
at the dinner, described the pattern as fallout of the law enforcement
crises the senator’s marriage caused; juxtaposing Mr Yerima’s position
as a lawmaker with the lack of will on the part of the law enforcement
agencies to prosecute him.

“Increasingly, a lot of us now see cases of paedophilia on the pages of our newspapers every day,” Mr Odinkalu said.

He countered Mr Yerima’s logic
that his religion permits such marriages, saying it is not tenable in a
civilized society like Nigeria’s. He argued that Mr Yerima’s marriage
to the child was not destined by faith, but a choice he made. “When a
man makes such a choice, society should be able to say, ‘that man is
unfit to make laws for us. That man is unfit to answer distinguished,
and unsafe for any civilised society.’”

Law enforcement crises

Emmanuel Ojukwu, the national
public relations officer of the Nigeria police, who also spoke at the
event, blamed the increasing incidences of girl child abuse on the
economy, and “politics and the lack of will to implement all decisions
made at every strata of government.” He also argued that the Nigerian
society and culture covers crime to save the face of the families
involved.

He narrated a case in which a man
above 50 years raped his about-four-year-old niece, and the mother of
the child tried to hide it, saying it is a family matter.

“These issues continue because we
all compromise,” Mr Ojukwu said. “Those who are supposed to speak keep
silent. When evil persists, we keep quiet; after all, it is our
culture, it is our religion, we don’t want our family to be exposed and
then we keep encouraging evil to continue and look for people to blame.

“What have you done when it
happens next to you? This gathering is a clarion call to all of us to
wake up to our responsibilities. We’ve kept quiet for too long. Now is
time to act.”

He advised the public to act by
supporting organisations like the GAFA that take it upon themselves to
dig out the vices in the society and sensitise the nation.

Other speakers at the event took
turns to condemn gender-based violence and marriages to children who
are mostly coerced into the contract. They argued that such sexual
relationships are rape and should be handled as strictly so by the law
enforcement agencies, notwithstanding the office of the individual
involved.

Ishak Bello, a justice of the
Federal Capital Territory Appeal Court, who also identified the
narrow-mindedness of the Nigerian society and family with regards to
handling issues of girl child abuse, argued differently, saying sexual
intercourse with children is defilement, and not rape.

“Of course she is not in the
position to give consent, in law,” the judge said. “It is not even
love-making; you are just having sex with her.”

Besides the condemnations, the
dinner was good and donations rolled out generously in support of the
GAFA who have also asked to be joined in the suit the Islamic community
have filed against the federal government and the senate over the
matter.

There is apprehension in the National
Assembly over the rejection by state legislatures of the some aspects
of the 1999 constitution recommended by the federal legislature for
amendment.

Members of the ad-hoc committees of the
two chambers, which reviewed the document, are worried that the rate at
which the state legislatures are rejecting the recommendations
contained in the report presented to the Speakers last month may
endanger the process of producing a brand new constitution for the
country.

The committees are particularly worried
that getting the two-thirds majority of the state legislatures to
approve the document may be a mirage, thereby, scuttling the process
which has consumed time and resources in the last two years.

About 12 state Houses of Assembly have
rejected some key amendments contained in the report presented to them
at a ceremony in Abuja. Among the key issues that have been dumped by
assemblies is the provision for independent candidacy.

The states that have reportedly
concluded work on the report forwarded to them included: Adamawa, Imo,
Ogun, Zamfara, Edo and Enugu. Others are Jigawa, Kaduna, Osun, Gombe,
Plateau, Benue, Ebonyi and Rivers. Others are still conducting public
hearings on the amended constitution.

Among the aspects rejected by the state
legislatures are independent candidacy, financial autonomy for the
legislature, raising of educational qualification for candidates for
National Assembly elections and cross carpeting.

A source in the committees said last
Friday that the federal lawmakers are particularly unhappy over feelers
that the rejection of some aspects of the amended constitution was
instigated by the state governors and, therefore, not in the national
interest. They are said to have expressed sadness that those aspects
were rejected even though the ad-hoc committees of the Senate and House
were always in touch with the Speakers of the State Assemblies while
the review lasted.

It was learnt that the governors, who
want to second terms in office, are behind the rejection of the
independent candidacy clause in the amended document because it will
increase the competition for their positions during next year’s general
election if the constitution comes into operation.

The federal lawmakers, the source said,
are also worried that their state counterparts are tampering with the
document even though the constitution only requires them to approve.

“We have it on good authority that the
governors are tele-guiding the lawmakers in their states to do their
bidding. The issue of independent candidacy, for instance, is one of
those aspects the governors are asking them not to approve because that
will narrow the competition during the elections.

“The failure or even delay in approving
the document by the state may pose a great danger to the entire
exercise. It may mean that the job the National Assembly did was in
vain, especially as the general elections approach. This is worrisome,”
the source said.

Some of the federal lawmakers are
already brainstorming on what to do to check the development, which in
their thinking could derail the whole process of reviewing the
11-year-old constitution.

Apart from convening a meeting with the
Speakers, the leaderships of the Senate and the House of
Representatives are also considering dispatching all the principal
officers and influential members of both chambers to their states to
lobby for the approval.

“Yes, they are already thinking of what to do, like lobbying the Speakers in many ways,” said the source.

The chairmen of the Senate ad-hoc
committee on the constitution review and Deputy Senate President, Ike
Ekweremadu and his House counterpart, Usman Nafada, could not be
reached for comments. Their spokespersons, Paul Odenyi and Hammeed
Bello, refused to comment, saying their principals have not briefed
them, especially since it is the lawmakers’ affairs.

Also, attempts to speak to the
consultant to the National Assembly on the review on Friday were also
rebuffed, as they said they are not competent to speak.

“Go to the lawmakers,” one of them told our reporter.

Not preempt the states

Speaking on the
issue, Senate spokesperson, Ayogu Eze, says the National Assembly will
not preempt the report of the State Assemblies because they are yet to
submit them.

“It is not for us
to comment on what we read in the newspapers. That will amount to
preempting the report of the state legislatures. They are yet to
forward their reports to us and so we cannot begin to say this is their
position or this is what we will do,” Mr Eze said last Friday.

His House
counterpart, Eseme Eyiboh, who spoke in the same vein said it is only
when a formal report is submitted to the National Assembly that an
action can be taken. He said he cannot predict what will happen.

Mr Eyiboh also
denied that there is apprehension among his colleagues over the
positions of the state lawmakers, saying, “That cannot be true. What
you are saying cannot jeopardize the process because it is already on
course. Everything the National Assembly did in the course of the
amendment was done taking into consideration the national interest.”
The lawmaker also denied claims that the State Assemblies were given a
deadline for reporting back to the National Assembly.

On June 15, the
National Assembly, at an elaborate ceremony in Abuja handed over the
amended constitution to the State Assemblies. The chairman of the
Conference of the Speakers of the State Houses of Assembly and the
Speaker of the Taraba State House of Assembly, Sylvanus Gbana, received
the document on behalf of his colleagues.

Besides, the Clerk of the National Assembly also transmitted a copy of the document to the state legislatures.

However, about
eight days later, there was a controversy over the document, as the
House of Representatives, at its plenary session on June 24, complained
that the clean copy forwarded to the states was the Senate version and
not the harmonised version of the conference committee set up by both
chambers and subsequently approved by the two chambers on June 2 and 3,
respectively. It, therefore, directed the Clerk of the House to liaise
with the Clerk to the National Assembly with a view to withdrawing the
document.

The matter has
since been settled. The chairman of the House ad-hoc committee on the
review of the constitution, Usman Nafada, who is also the Deputy
Speaker, said in a statement that the mistake had been rectified.
According to him, the cover of the harmonised version sent to the state
legislature carried the imprint of the Senate but with the right
contents, instead of the imprint of both chambers.

That controversy was just one of the many that followed the amendment of the constitution in the last two years.

The very first
controversy was over the actual position of Mr Nafada in the National
Assembly Joint Committee on Constitution Review (JCCR). While senators
said the Deputy Speaker should merely be deputy chairman of the joint
committee, members of the House insisted he should be a co-chairman
since both chambers are equal.

The disagreement led to both Houses conducting the amendment separately until they reached the harmonization stage.

Earlier in June,
members were at a loss over whether the amended document should be sent
to Goodluck Jonathan for his assent just like he does to other laws
made by the National Assembly.

Revelations about bribery cases continue to flood
in this season. Last Monday, Technip, the international company based
in France, agreed to pay a fine of $338million to the United States for
bribing Nigerian government officials to get contracts. The following
day, French news agency AFP reported a ‘bribe’ case involving Desmond
Tutu, the famous Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town.

In an interview with the agency, Danny Jordaan,
the Chief Executive Officer of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, revealed how
Mr. Tutu had offered to bribe FIFA officials. According to Mr. Jordaan,
the archbishop “promised Fifa top brass a first-class pass to heaven if
they granted then-World Cup hopeful South Africa the host bid”.

Mr. Jordaan is said to have been shocked by the
cleric’s offer because Mr. Tutu had “told South African organisers that
he would only support a bribe-free South African bid” before meeting
with FIFA officials. “Then we had our first meeting with the Fifa
executive and Archbishop Tutu said, `If you vote for us, I will make
sure that you get a first-class ticket to heaven,”’ Mr. Jordaan is
reported to have quoted the anti-apartheid campaigner as saying.

“I kept quiet and when we went out, I said, `Arch, but you said we must not bribe. Isn’t that a bribe?’” Mr. Jordaan said.

In response, the archbishop said, “No, no, it’s
not a bribe. A bribe is only when you give things to people who are
alive. In order to get their first-class ticket, they must first die.
That’s not a bribe.”

But it wasn’t only Mr. Tutu who offered ‘first-class’ treatment in
return for favour at this World Cup. Former board members of the
Nigeria Football Federation, who were sacked last week by President
Goodluck Jonathan, gave state FA chairmen a treat by paying for their
expenses to South Africa for the World Cup; a move which many believed
would have influenced the August elections into the board in favour of
those who sought re-election. An investigation into the dealings of the
board at the World Cup has been launched and it is likely to be found
that, this time, things were given to people who are alive.

The Lagos State government has established climate change clubs in 506 primary and secondary schools.

Bayo Akinwolere, the School Health Desk
Officer, Lagos State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) disclosed
this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN). Mr
Akinwolere said the clubs were established to raise awareness about the
adverse effects of climate change.

He said the project was carried out in
collaboration with the State Ministry of Environment, adding that it is
in line with the Greener Lagos Project of the state government.

Mr Akinwolere, who also is the
President, National Association of SUBEB School Health Officers Forum,
told NAN that the clubs were established in 2007.

“The purpose of establishing the clubs
in 506 schools in all the 20 Local Government Areas in the state, is to
bring about attitudinal change in the students regarding ozone
depletion substances. The initiative provides training for students as
well as the teachers, and the students are particularly happy to
sensitise their peers, parents and community members on the threat of
climate change,” he said. “They also sensitise their parents on the
dangers of inhaling fumes coming out of their aged cars, emission from
cooking stoves, fumes from generators, in order to change their
attitudes towards those acts.”

On sanitation, the desk officer said
the state Ministry of Environment, under the Lagos State School
Sanitation/Recycling Programme, had provided two waste bins to each
school in the state.

He said that the government had
provided 6,615 toilets comprising 1,458 pit latrines and 5,157 water
system variety, in primary schools. He added that 639 boreholes and
wells have also been provided to ensure that pupils drink water from
safe sources.

Mr Akinwolere put the total number of primary schools in Lagos State
at 985, while the number of teachers and pupils stand at 5,203 and
479,256.

Adebayo Ajibabi,
Head of Department of Agriculture in Badagry Local Government, on
Friday said that rice farmers in the area had abandoned the farms owing
to low productivity.

Mr Ajibabi told the
News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Badagry on Friday that the farmers, who
embraced commercial rice farming in 2008, had since left the farms.

He said that the government introduced the commercial farming project in 2008 to boost rice production in the state.

“Lagos State
government acquired acres of farmland in Toga area of Badagry to boost
rice farming,” he said. Mr Ajibabi said he assisted the state
government to recruit about 1,000 rice farmers during the period. He
added that the state government gave them rice, land and some other
incentives to boost rice production, “but government did not keep to
other promises made to the farmers”.

Mr Ajibabi said the farmers, who initially engaged in lowland rice farming, had since taken to other ventures, like fishing.

NAN recalls that
the Rice Millers Association of Nigeria had recently accused the
Nigeria Customs Service of killing local rice production through its
failure to check unbridled importation of the commodity.

The customs service has denied the accusation.

Not often are they called upon to
deliberate on matters of much significance to the country. Now,
legislators in the 36 states have found themselves in the sun. They
have to agree to the amendment of the 1999 constitution recently sent
to them by the National Assembly and they are making the best of the
opportunity.

Some have quickly assented to the
changes. Others are digging in their heels and subjecting the document
to a thorough debate. According to the law, any part of the
constitution can be amended if 2/3 of the country’s state legislatures
say so. A state may, therefore, reject a part of the proposed amendment
but may not get the necessary support from other states to stop the
change being made.

On the whole, the amendment bill has met uneven reception. Below is the status of the bill in some state legislatures.

Ondo

Over 500 memoranda on the bill were
presented at the public hearing and the process is still on. At the
public hearing, issues on the financial autonomy of the national and
state assemblies, age and qualification of contestants for elective
positions and cross-carpeting of politicians from one political party
to the other, were treated. The Speaker of the Assembly, Samuel
Adesina, said only contentious issues out of the 506 memorandum
received from the public would be considered.

Kebbi

The House of Assembly has constituted a
five-member committee to recommend areas to be reviewed in the
harmonised draft bill on the amendment of the 1999 Constitution. The
Speaker, Aminu Musa, while inaugurating the committee last Wednesday
called on members to hasten action, with a view to making meaningful
contributions in the ongoing constitution review.

Yobe

The Yobe State House of Assembly
rejected the proposed amendment of section 65 of the constitution,
which deals with the minimum educational qualification for election
into the assemblies. The assembly voted against the proposal at a
special sitting in Damaturu, saying the review would not solve the
problems associated with elections in Nigeria.

Sirajo Wakil, the Deputy Majority Leader of the assembly, said its position was based on the views of the people.

“Our argument on section 65 which deals
with qualification is that the amended section failed to give fair and
level playing ground to Nigerians,” he said.

Lagos

The National Assembly’s proposed
amendment of the 1999 Constitution was not well received at a public
hearing organised by the Lagos State House of Assembly on Monday June
20, 2010. The general response from participants was that “the
amendment does not meet the yearnings of Nigerians.”

Gombe

In Gombe, the assembly on Wednesday
also announced its objection to the proposal to raise the academic
qualification of political aspirants from the secondary school
certificates to a college diploma.

The assembly approved 27 proposed amendments and rejected 21.

The Speaker, Manga Bojude, said among
the rejected amendments were the sections dealing with the educational
qualification of candidates and section 106, which provides for
independent candidates in elections. The House also rejected section
190, which empowers the vice-president or deputy governor to act on
behalf of the president or governor after any leave that is beyond 21
working days.

The removal of section 66 of the
constitution, which empowers state governors to form disciplinary
committees to handle cases of misconduct against political office
holders was also rejected.

Adamawa

The Adamawa State Assembly adopted the
amendment bill, but rejected financial autonomy contained in the bill.
The lawmakers, in their sitting on Wednesday, voted 10 against six and
nine against eight respectively to reject the alteration of section 81
and section 121 respectively that guaranteed financial autonomy to
INEC, legislatures and judiciaries at the national and state levels.

It also unanimously rejected the
provisions for independent candidacy and the pegging of diploma as
minimum qualification for candidates seeking elective offices.

Edo

The Edo House of Assembly also on
Wednesday rejected 14 of the 41 sections of the Constitution as amended
by the National Assembly. It rejected the amendment to the Sixth
Schedule of the Constitution but supported a proposal which would make
it legal for a serving legislator to move from the political party on
which he was elected to another political party without forfeiting his
seat. The proposal by the National Assembly to transfer Sections 221 to
227 to the Electoral Act was also upheld by the legislators.

Ekiti

Most members of the Ekiti House of
Assembly on Tuesday described the content of the amendment bill as
fraudulent. Sections 65 (A) and 68 (1) G concerning upward review of
qualification of persons that could contest elective positions as well
as cross-carpeting were some of the contentious issues. Lawmakers also
opposed cross-carpeting and voted against it. Some argued that
approving such an amendment was capable of turning Nigeria into a one
party state.

Plateau

The Plateau House of Assembly is still
planning to convene a stakeholders’ meeting to deliberate on the
harmonised copy of the amended constitution.

“We have received a copy of the harmonised version of the amended
constitution and shall have a public hearing to make inputs into the
document,’’ the Speaker, Istifanus Mwansat, said at plenary on Monday
in Jos.

The Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB)
is presently overwhelmed with petitions from members of the public
alleging false declarations of assets against some federal and state
public office holders, NEXT has learnt.

Despite the fact that Nigeria’s
law does not permit the public declaration and revelation of assets of
public servants, a deluge of petitions from citizens who know what some
public servants secretly declared as assets are being forwarded to the
CCB on daily basis, revealing hidden facts and figures.

Efforts made to find out how many
of such petitions have been received were unfruitful, as the Bureau
refused to give out the details.

Also, the names and positions of
public office holders accused of false declarations of assets could not
be confirmed, no thanks to the unwillingness by CCB officials to speak,
against the provision of the CCB Act.

But sources at the bureau claimed
that petitions on false declarations of assets were increasing daily
and that only its management have access to the petitions.

Verify false declarations

However, Sam Saba, the Chairman of
the Code of Conduct Bureau, last week at a two-day public enlightenment
programme in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, organised for state and local
government officials by the Bureau and the Rivers State government,
gave an indication of the situation confronting the anti-corruption
agency.

The programme had the theme,
“Ethics, Code of Conduct and the Pride of the Public Officers”. Mr Saba
said that plans were underway to constitute a 25-man team of the Bureau
officers across the country to investigate petitions received relating
to asset declarations.

He added that the committee will
move from state to state, collating petitions, and investigating them
with a view to ascertaining the truth or falsity in the declarations.

He reminded public servants that
were either elected or appointed recently and others, that keeping
foreign accounts after taking public office is tantamount to a breach
of the code of conduct for public officers.

Murtala Adebayo Sanni, the
Chairman of the Code of Conduct Tribunal, advocated a strong political
will and legislative reforms to ensure the prosecution of corrupt
public officials, serving or out of office. Mr Sanni also highlighted
the punishments the tribunal is empowered to impose on a public officer
found guilty of contravening the Code of Conduct for public officers.
They include: the payment of fines, vacation of office, and
disqualification from holding public office for a period up to 10
years. The tribunal currently lacks the power to imprison anybody
convicted of contravening the code.

“Corruption,” according to Mr.
Sanni, has become “so pervasive, entrenched and destructive that
special measures have to be taken to rid Nigeria of corruption and
corrupt practices” while the “penalties the tribunal is empowered to
impose should include powers to imprison those that have been found to
have contravened the code.”

The bureau’s travails

The CCB has been branded a lame
duck by most citizens for its inability to deal with corruption
regarding outright refusal of public officers to declare assets,
over-exaggerated declaration of assets, the duplication of
anti-corruption activities under the purview of the EFCC and ICPC, low
turnout of convictions and the aiding of corrupt public officers
through hoarding of information supposedly within the public domain.

In May, the agency said that it has received the asset forms of the
president, Goodluck Jonathan and vice president, Namadi Sambo. It is
commonly believed that other public office holders of the
administration have since complied with the provisions of the CCB Act
and Handbook for public officers.

About two years after foreign law enforcement agencies slammed punitive fines in the US and Germany on Siemens for bribing officials of foreign countries – including Nigeria – to secure contracts, no Nigerian has been prosecuted.

As
Nigerian law enforcement agencies engage in what appears to be an
everlasting investigation of government officials indicted abroad for
corruption, one country, the United States, is busy raking in massive
revenue on account of Nigeria’s dereliction.

Nigeria’s bribery
misfortune has so far generated over N300 billion (approximately $2
billion) in revenue for the United States government, from fines it
imposed on companies which bribed Nigerian officials to corner
government contracts. Our analysis of the three current major
international bribery scandals (Siemens, Halliburton/TSKJ, Daimler)
involving Nigerian officials, indicates no traction or indictment from
the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), the agency that
leads investigations relating to economic and financial crimes.

This
finding also coincides with the release of a business survey on crime
and corruption in our country, which indicates that Nigerians have
“little trust in anti-corruption authorities.”

The report is a
collaboration between the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), the
Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), the European Union
(EU), and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).

“It
is hard to have any confidence in these agencies, and all these endless
investigations point at nothing but a case of dereliction, and probably
collaboration, or both,” said Jiti Ogunye, a leading public interest
lawyer in Lagos, who wondered angrily “how come that 19 years after
Siemens, (the Germany-based multinational electrical firm) agreed to
pay fines to both the US and German authorities for bribing officials
of foreign countries – including Nigeria – to secure contracts, no
Nigerian has been prosecuted?”

Another attorney, Abuja-based Charles
Musa, said if the US government is fining its own citizens, and its
companies, it is unfortunate that Nigeria, where all the bribery took
place, be it Anammco or Halliburton, is just grandstanding and playing
to the gallery, and not serious about prosecuting its citizens.

“In
a proper country, those companies should have been fined themselves,
and they’ll be blacklisted. It’s unfortunate that we don’t have the
political will to prosecute any crime in this country as long as it
doesn’t involve a poor man. These people are well known, they (their
names) are on the Internet, they are in US court papers, and nothing
has happened to them. It is unfortunate,” he said.

US revenue

The
revenue made by the United States represents fines paid by bribe
givers: Siemens, Kellogg Brown & Root, Technip and Daimler AG, to
the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the Department of
Justice in settlement agreements, for giving kickbacks to Nigerian
officials in exchange for multibillion dollar contracts. And by the
time investigations are completed in the $182 million Halliburton
bribery scandal, which has so far yielded $917 million dollars for the
U.S. government, the country is likely to rake in an additional N68
billion (approximately $449million) in fines from a former Halliburton
executive Albert Jackson Stanley, two United Kingdom citizens, Jeffrey
Tesler and Wojciech Chodan, and ENI of France, a member of the infamous
TSKJ consortium.

Already, Mr Stanley has been sentenced to seven
years in jail and he is to pay $10.8 million in restitution. Tesler and
Chodan, who allegedly coordinated the elaborate bribery scheme on
behalf of the TSKJ consortium, have also been indicted by a federal
grand jury in Houston and might forfeit $132 million to the American
government.

Investigations into ENI’s involvement in the bribery
scheme is still ongoing but in anticipation of its indictment, the
company has already set aside 250 million euro, an amount it plans to
deploy in a settlement agreement with the SEC and the Department of
Justice.

America has accused the company of violating its Foreign
Corrupt Practices Act, which forbids “certain classes of persons and
entities to make payments to foreign government officials to assist in
obtaining or retaining business.”

Unwilling Nigeria

But
while the U.S. is prosecuting its citizens involved in the scams and
compelling concerned companies to pay huge fines, Nigeria, where the
offences were committed and whose citizens received the bribes, has
failed to properly investigate the cases and punish those involved.

“What
that means is that Nigerian laws and institutions are not working and
we are paying dearly for that,” said Bunmi Aborisade, an adjunct
professor at the State University of New York. “If those fines had been
paid to our country, it would have gone a long way in alleviating
poverty among our people. But that is even if the fine proceeds are not
stolen again.”

Siemens was the first to enter into a settlement
agreement with the SEC and the American justice department. On December
12, 2008, in a charge brought against it in a US District Court for the
District of Columbia, the German company agreed to pay $350 million in
disgorgement to SEC and a $450 million criminal fine to the justice
department.

The company had earlier paid fines of 395 million Euro
(approximately $569 million) and 201 million Euro(approximately $285
million) to the office of the Prosecutor-General in Munich, Germany,
over the same charge that it bribed Nigerian officials to corner four
telecommunication contracts.

When Siemens first entered into these
plea agreements, the Nigerian government blacklisted it and suspended
it from handling government contracts. But the Umaru Yar’Adua
administration soon lifted the suspension, saying the company had
repented. The company did not pay any fine and nobody was prosecuted
for the crime.

Two months later, in February 2009, Kellog Brown and
Root parted with $177 million and $402 million in payments it made to
SEC and the department of justice for its role in the bribing of
top-level Nigerian officials in exchange for the contract to build our
$6 billion Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas plant.

The two U.S.
agencies then went after German automaker, Daimler, and got it to cough
out a total $185 million in fines to settle charges that it compromised
Nigerian officials to award several vehicle supply contracts to it.

With
the announcement on Monday that Technip, a member of the TSKJ
consortium, had agreed to pay $338 million for its role in the bribery
of Nigerian officials, America’s total earning from enforcement
proceedings in the $182 million Halliburton bribery scam alone now
stands at $917 million (approximately N138 billion).

“The
resolutions announced today demonstrate once again the department’s
commitment to aggressively investigate and prosecute international
bribery by U.S. and foreign corporations alike,” the justice
department’s Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Mythili
Raman, said in a statement. “The fact that Technip now must pay
criminal penalties and civil disgorgement totalling $338 million should
make clear that, in the end, bribery of foreign officials will have
consequences.”

Not finished

Yet the Americans
are not finished. ENI, another member of the TSKJ consortium, is being
investigated and both SEC and the Justice department are likely to file
separate charges against the company before long. The fourth member of
the TSKJ Consortium, JGC Corporation of Japan, may, however, escape
U.S. sanctions because it is not listed in the New York Stock Exchange.
It is listed in the Tokyo Stock Exchange.

The U.S. authorities said
it was determined to bring to book all those involved in bribing
foreign officials in exchange for business favours.

“The FBI is
committed to pursuing those who disrupt the level playing field to
which companies in the U.S. and around the world are entitled,” said
FBI Assistant Director Kevin L. Perkins. “This case (Technip’s)
demonstrates the FBI’s commitment to aggressively investigate
violations of this law. We will continue to investigate FCPA matters by
working in partnership with other law enforcement agencies, both
foreign and domestic, to ensure that both corporations and executives
who bribe foreign officials in return for lucrative business contracts
are punished.” Analysts say while America’s FBI and SEC are matching
words with action, Nigeria’s EFCC, responsible for the Nigerian end of
the investigation, is running round in circles and barking without
biting.

Not lifting a finger

“It is quite
unfortunate and pathetic that foreign countries have brought to justice
those who have engaged in bribery while doing businesses in Nigeria,
while Nigeria, the victim of these corrupt practices, has not lifted a
finger in such despicable acts against the country,” said Bukola
Oreofe, executive director, Nigeria Liberty Democratic Forum, a New
York-based pro-democracy group.

“One can only leave to the
imagination the number of schools, hospitals, roads, agricultural
development, avoidable deaths that would have been averted if Nigeria
had been protected from this fleecing or if the country, through her
own criminal statutes, could bring the local and foreign perpetrators
to justice.

“If the United States can earn millions from such punishment, it is sad that Nigeria looks the other way,” Oreofe said.

Idris Akinbajo and Elor Nkereuwem contributed to this report.

The federal government is ready to go the full trot
to sanitize our country’s football house and even though it is liaising
with the world football organising body FIFA over its decision to
suspend the Super Eagles, it is ready to damn the consequences of its
action, the minister of Sports, Ibrahim Bio, said yesterday in Abuja.

Following the poor outing of the Super Eagles, our
country’s football team, in the on-going World Cup in South Africa,
Goodluck Jonathan on Wednesday directed that Nigeria be withdrawn from
all international football competitions for the next two years.

Mr Bio, who met with the press at the presidential
villa yesterday, said the government can no longer live with the rot in
the football house simply because it wants to avoid FIFA sanctions.

“My friend, you cannot have cancer and continue to
live with it because you don’t want to spill blood; we are ready to
spill blood to remove the cancer,” he said.

The minister added that the government is more
concerned about the interest and sovereignty of the country and people
who are so passionate about football on this issue than what FIFA might
say.

“As you are all aware, Nigeria is so passionate about
sports and we are trying to have a deliberate policy whereby we can
encourage our local league to be very attractive so that not every time
we have to be looking to foreign-based players and when they are not
available we continue to wait,” he said.

The minister also said that the government is trying
to liaise with FIFA in order to get things done without necessarily
violating FIFA rules. He also said that the country cannot continue
with the old order, where the needed synergy between the ministry and
the Nigeria Football federation (NFF) is lacking.

“Nigeria will do everything possible to take the
interest and sovereignty of Nigeria first and foremost, and if that is
in conformity with FIFA rules, so be it, but if it is not in conformity
with FIFA rules, I think the sovereignty of Nigeria and interests of
the people is most paramount,” he said.

“Again, a situation whereby we have competitions and
there seems to be no proper coordination between the supervisory
ministry and NFF does not augur well for our football. Nobody is taking
anybody’s job but in the interest of this country, people should be
able to talk and do things better. What we presented at the World Cup,
was a shame.”

Lack of commitment

Mr Bio identified lack of commitment on the part of
the players as a problem that must be addressed, saying some of the
misses by our players showed complete lack of commitment on their part.

“I cannot imagine an international player misses a
goal that is almost two to three metres to the net and he is laughing
or smiling; there is no sign of regret,” he said. “That is the level of
patriotism that gets Nigerian government concerned. They should show
some sense of remorse and regret so that the people will not say that
it was an intended action.

“Invariably, what we want to do is to get people who by their
experience will restructure and reorganise our football and start right
from the grass roots, invigorate the clubs and encourage more football
academy where we can get young men to replace the present ones. That
takes time and experience.” Former minister of interior, Demola Seriki,
who was at the presidential villa, said the federal government’s action
is the best for us given the way the way football is going in our
country. He, however, said once the issue of football administration is
tackled, he does not see the country staying away for that long from
the international football scene.