Justice Mohammed Idris of a Federal High Court in Lagos has declared that successive governments since 1999 breached the fundamental principles of transparency and accountability for failing to disclose details about the spending of recovered stolen public funds, including a dedicated website.
The court ordered the government of President Muhammadu Buhari to ensure that his government and predecessors make full account of all recovered loots.
It said Buhari’s predecessors – Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, the late Umaru Musa Yar’Adua and Dr. Goodluck Jonathan – should make full account of the recovered stolen funds. Nigeria has recovered billions of dollars from former public office holders, including the late military Head of State, Gen. Sani Abacha.
So far, over $700 million Abacha loot had been recovered by the Swiss government and returned to Nigeria. Additional $300 million is being expected. The government of Liechtenstein, sometime ago, returned $227 million while government of the Channel Islands returned 140 million pounds sterling in the first instance and another 315 million pounds in a subsequent repatriation from the Abacha loot.
The management of the recovered loots had been shrouded in secrecy by the successive governments with allegations of mismanagement of the stolen funds.
- New Telegraph.
No comments:
Post a Comment