How we are tracking FG’s disbursement of $322.5 Abacha ― Group

AN Anti-corruption network organisation, Africa Network for Environment and Economic Justice (ANEEJ) has said that it has put all necessary machineries in place to track the ongoing disbursement of the $322.5 million Abacha loot by the Federal Government to the “poorest of the poor” Nigerians.

Executive Director of ANEEJ, Reverend David Ugolor, spoke on Wednesday in Abuja during the closing of a three-day media workshop on Asset Recovery and Anti-corruption issues in Nigeria. The workshop was organised by ANEEJ with support from the Swiss Embassy in Nigeria.

Ugolor who noted that ANEEJ was the civil society that witnessed the signing of the memorandum of understanding between Nigeria and Swiss governments for the repatriation of the $322.5 million Abacha loot, vowed that all efforts would be made to ensure that the money did not go down the drain the way of others.

He said ANEEJ also signed an MoU with the Federal Government that provided for transparency and accountability on the basis of which the civil society organisation launched a project called Monitoring of Asset Recovery through Transparency and Accountability (MANTRA Project), that was inaugurated by the Vice-President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo.

He said ANEEJ under the MANTRA project was mandated to build the capacity of the civil society organisations and the media in order to be able to monitor the disbursement of $322.5 million recovered Abacha loot currently domiciled in the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).

ALSO READ:  2019 general elections: NHRC moves to gauge hate speech, fake news

He said his organisation has been working closely with the Cash Transfer office in the office of the Vice-President and that they have been very cooperative in terms of providing information.

Ugolor said the first batch of the monitoring exercise had been launched where monitoring teams including the media were deployed to 11 states benefiting from the Cash Transfer programme.

He said the teams were able to talk to some of the beneficiaries of the N5000 monthly Cash Transfer, saying he was impressed even though there were some challenges.

He said: “We are impressed with what we saw on the ground although it was not a perfect situation because there were some challenges.

“But the fact that we had an experience in 2014 and 2015, where the first Abacha loot returned went down the drain. Comparing with that time to this time, there is a dramatic improvement on the issue of access to information.

“Some people would say is it benefiting the poor, yes, it does. People sit on their comfort zone in Abuja and Lagos saying what will N5000 do? But we met with very poor people who have not had access to such money and are now able to buy drugs to treat their children, work together to undertake some livelihood projects.

“That for me is something remarkable and something to build on,” he said.

Ugolor said there was however room for improvement, adding that was part of the responsibility of the civil society.

He added that it was a good thing that the Federal Government has signed up for Open Government Partnership, which has given the civil society access to fully engage the government agencies on the asset recovery.

He also commended the current administration of President Muhammadu Buhari for coming up with a national policy on Social Investment programme, stressing that it was a framework that must be implemented by any candidate that wins in the forthcoming presidential election.

He said the Transparency International just released their corruption perception index that placed Nigeria on 144 over 180, which indicated that more has to be done including passage into law of the Proceed of Crime Bill that is before the National Assembly.

He said: “The whole purpose of this training is to follow up activity after the United States of America and United Kingdom governments hosted the global forum asset recovery, all the countries that attended that forum in 2017 agreed to implement basic principles of asset recovery which is transparency and accountability.

“We as Civil Society that participated in that forum agreed to carry out some activities that would help domesticate these principles.

“We also realise that media would play a vital role if asset recovery would become reality in Nigeria. On the basis of that we decided to organise this training with support from the Swiss Embassy in Nigeria.

He noted this was the first in the series and that in the next few months, there would be another training programme with the understanding that with knowledge, journalists would now be able to investigate around asset recovery in Nigeria.

He said this would also enable journalists to report and raise awareness that could generate political support for asset recovery in the country.

The post How we are tracking FG’s disbursement of $322.5 Abacha ― Group appeared first on Tribune Online.