EFCC tackles NBA president; says Nigerian Bar populated by ‘rogues, vultures’

EFCC Chairman, Ibrahim Magu

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, has rejected a proposal by the president of the Nigerian Bar Association, Abubakar Mahmoud, for the agency to be stripped of its prosecutorial powers, saying the call is “self-serving” and aimed at creating “a cabal of

untouchables”.

In a stinging statement signed by spokesperson Wilson Uwujaren, the EFCC said senior lawyers have been complicit in cases of corruption and money laundering, and some NBA members are “rogues and vultures”.

“It is too much of a strange coincidence that the suggestion to strip the EFCC of its prosecutorial powers is being floated few months after the Commission, in unprecedented fashion arraigned some senior lawyers for corruption,” the statement said.

Read full statement:
The 56th Annual General Conference of the Nigerian Bar Association came to an end August 26, in Port Harcourt with the bar making pronouncements on major issues of national importance.

One of the new commitments as articulated by the new President of the Association, Mr. Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, is to reinvent the association by reclaiming its moral high ground through a campaign for ethical rectitude by members of the bar.

“The NBA under my watch will fight judicial corruption. We shall make the legal profession unattractive for corrupt lawyers,” he said.

This is reassuring considering the evidence that senior members of the Bar have become complicit in cases of corruption and money laundering, leading to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, arraigning two members of the inner bar for acts of corruption. A Bar populated or directed by people perceived to be rogues and vultures cannot play the role of priests in the temple of justice.

The EFCC appreciates the NBA’s acknowledgement of the Commission’s strategic place in the fight against corruption in Nigeria and the modest achievements that it has recorded so it. It also welcomes the suggestion for reform. As the Acting Chairman, Ibrahim Magu has repeatedly started in his public pronouncements, the agency is open to suggestions that will improve its operations as it cannot pretend to have a monopoly of ideas on how to fight corruption.

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