The Presidency has commenced efforts
to strengthen the mechanism of the
Whistle blower policy following
breakthroughs in the war against
corruption and unaccounted wealth. Senior Special Assistant to the
President on Media, Garba Shehu, told
State House correspondents on
Wednesday, that the response of
Nigerians to the whistle blower policy
had boosted the tempo of the anti- corruption crusade of the Buhari’s
administration. The aide explained that the
government was considering ways of
enhancing the structural capacity of the
whistle blower mechanism. “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”, he said. Shehu said no public policy could
succeed or go far enough without
public support and participation. “When the citizens realise they were
victims of corruption, they may feel
encouraged to join the efforts to
expose looted funds”, he said. Shehu said the huge amounts of looted
funds being recovered by 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.’’ He noted that the election of President
Buhari in 2015 was a divine
intervention and that stealing by
officials under a democratic
government at the expense of people’s
welfare “is worst betrayal of voters’ mandate’’. According to him, “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 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.