Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media, Garba Shehu, has announced the plan by the Presidency to give whistle blowing policy that has so far helped to expose looted funds in their hidden places across the country a strategic and national direction.
According to him: “Government thinks that the whistle blower mechanism is too important to be left without a strategic, national direction.”
Garba Shehu, who spoke to news men at the Presidential Villa, Abuja today, Wednesday, made it clear that Nigerians to the whistle blower policy had boosted the tempo of the anti-corruption crusade of the Muhammadu Buhari’s administration.
He stressed that government is considering ways of enhancing the structural capacity of the whistle blower mechanism, saying: “the government is considering empowering the mechanism by either bringing it under the Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption, PCAC or some other body to imbue the process with a strategic national purpose.
“In a word, government thinks that the whistle blower mechanism is too important to be left without a strategic, national direction.”
Garba Shehu insisted that no public policy could succeed or go far enough without public support and participation.
“When the citizens realize they were victims of corruption, they may feel encouraged to join the efforts to expose looted funds.”
The Presidential spokesman said that the huge amounts of looted funds being recovered by the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC) and the whistle blower efforts “is a revelation about the mindless, callous and reckless scale on which Nigeria had been robbed by unpatriotic and egregiously selfish public officials.
According to him, the election of President Buhari in 2015 was a divine intervention even as he said that stealing by officials under a democratic government at the expense of people’s welfare “is worst betrayal of voters’ mandate.
“Government is getting suggestions to bring the issue of illegal weapons in the hand of citizens that are being used to fuel intra and inter-communal violence under the purview of whistle blower policy.
“Yes, it is true; the presidency has received suggestions that call for the whistle blower policy to be extended to the possession of illegal weapons by powerful individuals in the country. The government will look at all that and make a pronouncement.
“Nigerians would be encouraged to expose the presence of illegal weapons in the homes of powerful politicians and other public figures, who may use those deadly arms for sinister political agenda.
“Those patriotic Nigerians exposing looted funds deserve all the encouragement and protection to sustain their enthusiasm, with a view to encouraging more citizens to participate in this major aspect of the anti corruption crusade.”
Garba Shehu assured that the Buhari’s administration would ensure judicious use of all recovered funds and commended Nigerians for their support. [myad]
