“I have confidence that the next constitutional amendment will strip these public officials of this immunity and I am personally in support of that”.
PRESIDENT Umaru Musa Yar’Adua has announced his support for the removal of the immunity clause, which shields the President, Vice President, state governors and deputy governors from prosecution as stipulated in the 1999 Constitution.
The President also said that in furtherance of the on-going war against corruption, his administration would soon introduce new legislation that will make all violations and disrespect for due process punishable by law.
According to a statement issued from Davos, Switzerland, by the Special Adviser to the President (Communications), Mr. Olusegun Adeniyi, Yar’Adua said he was confident that such public officials would soon be stripped of their current immunity from prosecution.
Adeniyi quoted the President who spoke on Wednesday at a dinner hosted by the Partnership Against Corruption Initiative as part of activities at the Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum as saying: “I have confidence that the next constitutional amendment will strip these public officials of this immunity and I am personally in support of that.”
The Initiative was formally launched in 2004 by Chief Executive Officers of global engineering, construction, energy, metals and mining industries to develop multi-industry principles and practices that will result in a competitive level-playing field, based on integrity, fairness and ethical conduct.
He indicated his expectation that the removal of the immunity clause from the Constitution would greatly facilitate the work of Nigeria’s anti-corruption agencies, which “have been granted total and complete independence of action by his administration.”
Yar’Adua went on: “One thing I have done is to give them total and complete independence of action. The institutions are directly under me in the Presidency; so when I assumed office, I called their chairmen and told them that they have total independence to go and act within the law: that is the only condition I gave, that everything they do must be within the law establishing them and within the laws of the federation.”
He also said that in furtherance of the on-going war against corruption in Nigeria, the Federal Government will soon introduce new legislation that will make all violations and disrespect for due process punishable by law.
“We now have a situation in which people award contracts without caring whether they have enough money to complete the project and because of this, there are lots of abandoned projects all over the country, in fact, some going into billions of dollars. This is the kind of disrespect for established regulations and procedures that feeds corruption.
“Our decision to fight corruption properly and have respect for law, order and due process will now make such acts of omission or commission punishable by law, and that will clean the system and make sure that whatever business dealings government enters into, we have the ability to abide by the covenant we signed. In fact, that is the path of honour, not only for any government but also for companies that are operating in Nigeria.”
The President said that his administration would also implement other measures “to ensure that opportunities to commit corruption are reduced to the barest minimum so that anybody, any public official who commits an act of corruption will know he has done it as a deliberate attempt, not because he has an opportunity to commit corruption.”
He added: “One of the responsibilities of leadership is to protect the followers from harming themselves, therefore leaders must shoulder the responsibility of ensuring that they have systems that do not encourage corrupt practices, systems based clearly on the rule of law, regulations and procedures.
“The truth is that some companies have benefited materially from corruption, while we, the governments and the nations, are usually at the receiving end, because very few people benefit from corrupt actions. In nations where corruption thrives, the vast majority are shortchanged; so the measures and the steps you are taking really require courage.
“I will like to see this initiative being vigorously pursued and publicised so that in the near future when we are doing business in Nigeria and we see a list of companies which come for competition, we can ask, which are those companies that have acceded to Partnership Against Corruption Initiative? These are the companies we will do business with. I think when you push forward and pursue this initiative vigorously, we will reach that point.”