- CSOs plan to mount pressure
Growing calls for the removal of Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Mr. Ibrahim Lamorde, heightened at the weekend as members of Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) called for his immediate sack.
The campaign for Lamorde’s disengagement is led by 20 civil society organisations under the aegis of the Coalition for Civil Liberty and Equity, CCLE.
In a statement issued by the coalition yesterday, it said the affected CSOs have concluded plans to stage a protest in Abuja today for the sack of Larmode.
The statement was signed by Mallam Isa Haruna of the Arewa Front for National Advancement, AFNA, and Muideen Olaniyi of the Network for
National Integration, NNI.
They said that the protest is to draw attention to the compromised nature of the EFCC under Larmode’s watch.
The leaders of the coalition alleged that the “sudden resurgence of the EFCC after a long period of hibernation and lack of direction under Mr. Larmode amounts to grandstanding and cosmetic efforts to deceive the present administration and Nigerians that the anti-graft body was working.”
The group warned that unless Larmode was removed, “the present witch-hunt and cabal-sponsored arrests and bogus charges would cast Nigeria in bad light before the international community and all men of good conscience.”
According to Haruna and Olaniyi, the EFCC boss is a “tainted watchman, given his penchant for bias and culpability over pension fraud in the country. It is on record that Larmode was fingered by the Senate Committee on Establishment in 2013 over the conduct of biometrics for pensioners in the Diaspora.
“It was discovered that Larmode collected estacodes twice for biometrics abroad and never went for any and refunded only one of the estacodes. Larmode should also explain why he received allowances for meetings he never attended with the Pension Reform Task Team.”
The groups decried the manner in which the commission had undertaken the arbitrary arrest of former Jigawa State Governor Sule Lamido and his sons, former Head of Service, Mr. Stephen Orosanye and a host of other Nigerians, stating that if the ugly trend persisted, Nigerians of good intentions would be wary of serving in government.
