The ICPC is one of the government`s tools to protect people of Nigeria against corruption. What is the full meaning of ICPC? It has been 17 years since it was launched. Still, there are corruption cases that occur in Nigeria? Does it mean that they do not perform their work well? Continue reading to find out!
Full Meaning of ICPC in Nigeria
The full meaning of ICPC is Independent Corrupt Practices Commission. This Nigerian agency was created on September, 26th in 2000. The initiator of its creation was the then President Olusegun Obasanjo. ICPC is aimed at persecuting corruption on any government level. Moreover, the commission has a task to overview suspicious financial cases of the Federal and Local governments and their officials.
The ICPC is also created to enlighten citizens of Nigeria about corruption cases and corruption policies of Nigeria.
ICPC Functions
According to the ICPC Act 2000, this organization has a duty to perform the following list of functions:
– Enlighten, rally and enlist citizens of Nigeria in the anti-corruption process;
– Educate and alert citizens about the consequences of corruption. Therefore, support the preventative measures in the corruption cases.
– The ICPC should advise the leaders of the government bodies about corruption measures in the country. Moreover, the commission should also help these leaders to assure the effectivity of anticorruption and anti-bribery procedures.
– The ICPC has a task to assist offices, agencies, and companies in taking the preventive measures against cases of corruption, bribery and public offenses.
– The ICPC should also test and practice new procedures and systems that can help to illuminate corruption in Nigeria.
– The ICPC must investigate any complaint about corruption and bribery cases in Nigeria.
ICPC Nigeria and its connection with other organizations
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The ICPC has been trying to work with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission since 2003. The EFCC was created to destroy money laundering and 419 fraud schemes. However, there have been some tensions between these two commissions. Therefore, they tried to investigate each other, but without visible results.
In June 2009, the ICPC started to work with international anti-corruption and anti-laundry organizations. Like:
– African Union Convention Against Corruption;
– Transparency International;
– United Nations Committee on Anti-Corruption;
– Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists.
ICPC Chairman
From the very beginning of ICPC creation, there were a lot of candidates that took the role of Chairman. The
– Justice Mustapha Akanbi. He was the first Chairman of the ICPC. He took the mandate in 2000 and finished his work in 2005.
– Justice Emmanuel Ayoola. He took the role of the Chairman after Justice Mustapha Akanbi in 2005. Emmanuel Ayoola finished his term in 2010.
– Professor Uriah Angulu. He started his term shortly after Justice Mustapha Akanbi, but he did not manage to take the ICPC mandate for long. In March 2011, Professor Uriah Angulu gave away his post.
– Dr. Rose Abang-Wushi was the second Acting Chairman of the ICPC. This person lasted only six months on the post – March-August 2011.
– Barrister Abdullahi Bako. He managed to act as chairman of ICPC for only four months.
– Barrister Ekpo Una Owo Nta. He was the last Acting Chairman of the ICPC. He is the current Chairman of ICPC. He has been holding his mandate since June 2012.
ICPC Prosecutions
The first three years for the ICPC were very hard. They received over 900 petitions about corruption. In 2003, the ICPC conducted about 400 investigations. The commission did not acieve much of success over its first four years of its existence. The Chairman of the ICPC, Justice Mustapha Akanbi blamed severe underfunding of the organization as the main reason for the lack of progress.
Also, the ICPC lack experience authority to conduct corruption investigations. Most of the petitions were accusations against governors. The ICPC did not have the power to investigate acting governors. Still, the commission managed to prosecute some cases, the most prominent of them are:
– Ghali Umar Na`Abba case;
– Fabian Osuji case.
One more thing, in August 2008, Chairman Emmanuel Ayoola found a loophole in the law about prosecution process. According to this, the ICPC has the authority to investigate ex-governors. Therefore, a number of governors were accused of corruption and money laundering shortly after they gave up their posts.
In August 2009, the commission managed to investigate the N90 million fraud of Pension Fund. In September 2009, the members of the ICPC investigated the mismanagement of N1 billion allegedly intended for Education Reform Programme.
ICPC Conclusion
According to the public report of 2015, the ICPC investigated more than 260 criminal cases and more than 140 civil cases. Nevertheless, there were a lot of controversies following the ICPC in 2011-2012. It created a line of acting chairmen up to 2012.
For today, the ICPC continue its investigation into corruption cases. The Federal Government still accuses the organization of the lack of progress. The ICPC continues to respond to these accusations with a lack of funding and legal power to prosecute the acting authorities.
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