Renowned cleric and former President of the Christian Association of Nigeria, Anthony Cardinal Okogie, has urged President Muhammadu Buhari to invite suspected looters of the country’s treasury for dialogue.
According to him, the fight against corruption would be made easier if looters were allowed to return their loot privately without calling out on them publicly.
Speaking with Punch, Okogie said it was also cheaper to recover loot through dialogue than charging suspected looters of public fund to court.
He said, “I agree with the National Peace Committee that the President should thread softly and should set criteria that he is going to use. Corruption is endemic in Nigeria. That is why they are asking for caution: ‘Look at it properly,’” he said.
The cleric urged President Buhari to invite those suspected to have looted government treasury “to speak to their conscience.”
Okogie said, “People like that, when they go to court, they don’t look right and left before they do things. If I have a man like that and I know he has the money, I will weigh the options; ‘will it profit the nation if I take this man to court. If I take him to court, he is going to get a lawyer. The lawyer will be employed with part of the money I am looking for.
“The lawyer will now start to ask for adjournments and all what not. I may not get this money until after four years. And the judge too, in the mean time, is getting (part of the loot); you will not know. He won’t just adjourn anyhow.
“The lawyer will invite his brother (the judge) to come and get part of the cake until half of it will be gone. We have to look at the issue from that angle. And you may end up getting nothing.”
When asked if such would be possible in a sanitised judiciary, he asked, “Is it sanitised?”
According to Okogie, these are the areas the President ought to have started his anti-graft war by “sanitising and purifying” the judiciary first. “At least, you will know that three-quarters of the place is tight, and then you can start (the probe),” he added.
The fiery cleric, who decried the spate of moral decadence in the society, stated that it was the responsibility of the family to bring up the child well.
He lamented that parents were no more disciplined as before, saying, “These days, they don’t care anymore. That is not right; that is not how they were brought up.”
He said, “Look at the probe that is going on now, for example; how can one person manage to get (steal) one-point-something billion; not even million but billion, and very soon you will hear of trillions? Where did he get it from? That is how it is going on, and he is from a family.
“And if his conscience worried him, he will run to his pastor to say ‘I want to pay tithe — 10 per cent; this is my tithe.’ The pastor collects the tithe. Seeing that it is huge money, the pastor will ask him, ‘what can I do for you?’”

fulanimafia:
With all due respect, this scare mongering by Okogie is demeaning to his repute.

1. Can he claim to not have heard of the serious efforts this administration is putting in to identify and appoint judges with integrity to prosecute corruption cases in particular?

2. Under what framework would his proposed dialogue take place and how would it be regulated?

3. There should be no semblance of compromise in this fight. There should be no basis for treating criminals differently because of their past positions or wealth if the blind nature of serving justice is to be adhered with.

obailala:
I think I totally agree with Okogie on this one. The fight against corruption is a very dicey one especially in a country where EVERYBODY is corrupt. Whrn you fight corruption, corruption will definitely fight back and with the large squad of the corruption football team, corruption will definitely win the game.

As much as I would like to see these big thieves named and shamed and locked up, a more realistic and workable solution to this mess is to covertly negotiate/dialogue with the looters to recover the monies that can still be recovered. Else, we might just spend the rest of our lives battling in court and the team of looters would unleash their massive arsenal to derail the government and Nigeria.

AngryNigerian:
Can people 4 God's sake stop talking from their noses! ah ah, watz ds 1 now?

If u had done ur job in the Church,would dey have had d guts of "impunitizing" corruption?

bjdon:


In any undertaking, you must always ask the simple question. 'Is the approach I am taking going to produce results?'. I think what Okogie and Kukah are saying , is that in a democratic landscape, it is actually very difficult to fight corruption with 'Thunder and brimstone' as it where. Please tell me are his points not valid? If I was a looter with billions at my disposal, do you honestly think I will just roll over? I will assemble the best team of lawyers I can get and fight the case every step of the way, and even after a possible conviction, I will appeal all the way to the supreme court. Please understand this is not the time of military and tribunals. All over the world the concept of plea bargains is used in difficult to convict cases. I see no reason why we can't employ something like that here. Nigeria has a lot of critical issues that need urgent attention, if we can get some money back from the looters quickly and quietly and deploy that on development and poverty alleviation programs is that not a good thing? As opposed to spending the next decades fighting in court after court. Remember till now we have not yet recovered all of the Abacha loot, almost 2 decades after his death.

fulanimafia:


With sufficient evidence and an uncompromised judiciary, the process will be surely expedited. Furthermore, recovering the loot will have minimal impact on governance due to other efforts being made at minimizing wastage and preventing looting, which will free up resources for development. Already allocation to states has risen to its highest level this year.

The point is that the fight against corruption should be uncompromising regardless, and the challenges that are inherent should be/are being pro-actively tackled.

Goke7:


Thank you jare, am a christian but the truth is the anti-corruption crusade will hit the church badly, reason father kukah is always running to aso rock, its surprising that Okogie who was a harsh critic of the last administration for their looting is finally realizing the damage buhari anti-corruption crusade will wreck on the church hence his blackmail now but like you said truly they all failed as christian leaders to condemn corruption right from the beginning it started.