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Ighomuaye Lucky, Benin
The Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission (ICPC), yesterday, said it will make public all abandoned Constituency contract projects and their handlers upon completion of investigation to serve as deterrent to others in Edo State.
It said constituency projects have been a major channel through which public funds are being siphoned.
The State ICPC Commissioner, Mr. Yusuf Olatunji, disclosed this in a town hall meeting put together by Social Action with support from the MacArthur Foundation on Promoting Accountable Governance Through Tracking of Constituency and Public Projects Implementation in the state.
“Just last week, we discovered another which we have not made public and we are still working on it to know how true it is. I cannot tell you for now but the commission will make public all the outcome of all the constituency projects tracking”, he said.
Speaking on the topic: “Corruption Issues in Constituency Projects Implementation; Need for Collective Engagement,” Olatunji said the commission has introduced another dimension into its ways of operations ‘called project tracking’ with the intension of fighting corruption, stressing that it should not be seen as a way of witch-hunting anybody or institution.
“We have introduced another dimension to fight against corruption and one of them is tracking of constituency projects.
“The idea of tracking constituency projects is not to witch hunt anybody. The idea is to examine how far they have done with our money”, he said.
The Commissioner added that the fight against corruption must be seen as a fight for all and not for anti-graft agencies alone as the commission is bedevilled with acute shortage of man-power.
“1,000 ICPC staff among two hundred million Nigerians, how do we fight corruption? EFCC, I am very sure, they do not have enough man-power too.
“This is where we all need to come together and fight the corruption”, he said.
Speaking for the state government, the Chief of Staff, Mr. Taiwo Akerele, represented by the Special Adviser to the governor/chairman, Strategic Planning and Programme Management Office, Mrs. Uyi Oduwa-Malaka, said the government is on course to deliver on its promises to the people of the state.
He said the government has invested much in the education and health sectors of its citizens, noting that the interactive session is apt to bring government closer to its people.
In his speech, the country’s director of MacArthur Foundation, Dr. Kole Shettima, who was represented by Hajia Salihu, said the issues of corruption should not be tired to the government and its officials alone, noting that we all are partakers of corrupt practices and we must all join hands to end it.
