Minister Designate Advocates Unbundling Of Nigeria’s Anti Graft Agencies

A Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN and minister designate, Mr. Lateef Fagbemi has advocated the unbundling of the country’s anti graft Agencies; the EFCC and the ICPC.

Mr. Fagbemi said doing so was a major way to address the issues of corruption in the country.

He spoke on Wednesday during his screening by the Senate as President Bola Tinubu’s nominee for appointment as Minister.

The lawyer, who was responding to questions bothering on corruption from senators, condemned the acts of carrying out arrests before investigations by the anti-graft agencies.

According to him, “Truth be told, you fight corruption but at the same time the way it’s fought in Nigeria leaves much to be desired. That is the truth. If I have my way, I will advise the President to unbundle, first of all, bring out ICPC, and EFCC together and unbundle them.”

He believes that, investigation of criminal offences should not be handled by the same body adding that there must be a supervisory authority within the same system.

“If there is investigation, it is another body, prosecution is another body. It doesn’t augur well to ask the same authority to do investigation and prosecution at the same time. That is when we have a problem.

“Investigation takes time especially in serious corruption cases. Are we prepared to wait. “My take is that a situation should be created such as the one that happened when Hushpuppi was arrested.

“They had been trailing him for years, he didn’t know and nobody will talk to him. But the day they said the time was up, he also knew that the time was up,” he stressed.

Mr. Fagbemi also said that investigation should be thorough.

Confidence Okwuchi