– Fear grips Imo government over missing bailout funds, N26.7 billion SEC bond proceeds
The Chief Justice of the Federation and Cross Rivers State born Walter Ononeghen has eventually acquiesced to the pressure from President Muhammadu Buhari with the setting up of a high powered judicial committee on corruption and other financial crimes. The committee is coming years after President Muhammadu Buhari admonished that without the effective cooperation and involvement of the judiciary, his war against corruption, would not succeed.
The inauguration which was delayed following the rejection by Justice Salami, who is the former President of the Court of Appeal to serve as the chairman of the committee eventually took place last Wednesday November 1, 2017. Inaugurating the 15 member committee with Justice Sulleiman Galadima as chairman, the Chief Justice of the federation Walter Ononeghen explained that the committee is the “judiciary response to expedite action on subsisting and lingering cases of corruption and financial crimes”, in several courts.
Justice Sulleiman in his own acceptance speech stated that his team with the caliber of men and women appointed as members is ready to deliver. President Buhari had earlier attributed the slow pace of our National development to corruption and thus vowed to fight the cancerous cankerworm frontally. The judiciary he said should be ready to interpret the law with which to fight corruption, “so we don’t continue to reap the wild wind of corruption, recklessness and impunities of the past administrations”.
Meanwhile, there is palpable fear in Imo state that the recent inaugurated committee on corruption and financial crimes expressly is targeting the authorities of Imo government House Owerri, where reports indicate that the N27.8 billion Bailout Fund, N13.5 billion Securities and Exchange (SEC) Bond Proceeds cannot be accountable by government officials, into whose hands and custody the funds were entrusted. The fate of the affected official is being made worst with the leadership of the Federal House of Representative resolving to revisit reports that most state governors stole the funds outrightly and went ahead to use some members of the Federal House as fronts in the stealing.
