CBN to unveil treasury looters returning monies

When it is time, the Central Bank of Nigeria will make information available to the public on surrendered funds, President Muhammadu Buhari said while delivering a speech at this year’s Anyam Osigwe Annual Foundation Lecture in Lagos on Friday.
“I must remark that it is yet early days, and any disclosure now may jeopardize the possibility of bigger recoveries,” the president said in his keynote address entitled INCORRUPTIBILITY; A SPIRITUAL PREMISE FOR MATERIAL WELLBEING.
Buhari’s critics had asked him to name names when he declared in one of his international travels that looters of Nigeria’s treasury were beginning to return their loot while investigation was yet to be concluded.
Admitting the fact that Nigerians need to know who returns what, Buhari said the information must be adequate when it shall come. “It is part of the collective effort to change our land from the bastion of corruption it currently is, to a place of probity and transparency,” he said.
In the address, the president noted that Nigerians are convinced, just like he and the APC are, that except corruption is curtailed, the country will remain in perennial regression.
“We must get to a point where every Nigerian begins to hate corruption with a passion, and collectively determine to root it out of our body polity,” he added as he explained how crucial the citizen support is in tackling corruption.
Taking out some time to defend his months-long rule as a military ruler in the 80s, Buhari said his cabal knew Nigerians had a pervert mindset, and were mostly undisciplined, which was the reason he governed with an iron fist then.
“The people saw where we were headed, and cooperated with us,” he said, noting, however, that the setting then—a military dictatorship—was different from now.
Identifying weak laws and loop-holes in justice administration in Nigeria’s democracy as challenges facing anti-corruption crusades in the country, he asked Nigerians to rise as one man, and stand for probity in both public and private lives.
“It is only then that we can be sure of dealing a mortal blow on corruption, which will engender a better country,” he said.