Coming on the heels of numerous corruption and financial crimes, the Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership (CACOL) has charged all the anti-corruption agencies in the country to make sure that they prosecute all suspects in the Halliburton and Siemens bribery scandals irrespective of class.
Debo Adeniran who is the Chairman of committee had revealed that the authorities had been taking too long in their findings into some of the high-profile cases.
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The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) had also in 2016 announced the reopening of the investigation and in a statement on Wednesday, Adeniran had also lamented that six years later, those culpable were yet to be prosecuted.
“No concrete action had been taken on the matter nor has there been any information on how far the agency had gone”, he complained.
CACOL highlighted its pursuit of justice through petitions, including its request that ex-Justice Minister and Attorney General of the Federation, Mohammed Adoke (SAN) be investigated for alleged extortion.
The statement recalled Adeniran’s position that the EFCC and others should look beyond Adoke in the $182million Halliburton scandal.
He mentioned ex-Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) President, Joseph Daudu (SAN), Emmanuel Ukala (SAN), Godwin Obla (SAN), Damian Dodo (SAN), and Roland Ewubare.
“Everyone else involved in the Halliburton and Siemens scandal must pay for their crimes, no matter who they are.
“One thing that is making corruption thrive in the country is the culture of impunity which is being enjoyed by many so-called “Big-men” in Nigeria.
“Once a crime is committed and there is no thorough investigation and subsequent prosecution of the culprits, there is the tendency that others would commit the same crime in higher magnitude.”
Adeniran had also noted that some of the cronies of the Halliburton and Siemens bribery scandals have been punished in their respective countries.
The activists decried the difficulty in Nigeria to prosecute those involved, “because they are influential and somehow more powerful than the state”.
In 2016, the EFCC had made a serious discovery of how $32.5million of about $200million fines from Halliburton Energy Services had been allegedly paid into a private account and about four former Heads of State and 89 prominent Nigerians had been allegedly linked with the scandal.
A former Minister of Petroleum Resources had also reportedly admitted to collecting money from a bribery agent and it had been revealed that about $2.5million was paid into his Switzerland account in 1998.
For Siemens, the United States Court that tried the company found that staff gave around $1.4billion in bribes in Nigeria, Russia and China for contracts that made over $1.1billion in profits.
