Olukoyede Offers 5% Reward For Information On Stolen Nigerian Assets Abroad

The Executive Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Ola Olukoyede, has offered whistleblowers up to five per cent of recovered assets for actionable information leading to the recovery of Nigerian assets stashed abroad.

Olukoyede made the offer on Wednesday while delivering a lecture at the 43rd International Symposium on Economic Crime in Cambridge, United Kingdom.

He urged anyone with credible information on monetary and non-monetary assets allegedly taken out of Nigeria through corrupt practices to come forward, promising a financial incentive upon successful recovery.

“I welcome all of you to the world of whistleblowing. If any one of you is privy to where Nigerian assets are stolen or taken to anywhere in the world, we have an incentive for you; between 2.5% and 5%, it’s going to go back to you upon recovery,” he said.

“That is an incentive we have put in place to encourage people to come forward to give information about stolen assets. You never tell if you give any information here, some of you may leave this place, multi-millionaire in your lifetime,” Olukoyede added, drawing applause from the audience.

The EFCC chairman said the incentive was part of efforts to encourage the flow of credible intelligence needed to trace and recover proceeds of corruption hidden in foreign jurisdictions.

He disclosed that the commission had, within less than three years of his assumption of office, secured forfeiture of cash and assets worth more than $500 million to the Nigerian government.

“Within three years of my assumption of office, we’ve been able to forfeit both cash and assets worth over half a billion dollars to the government,” he further revealed. .

Olukoyede attributed the recoveries to the professionalism of EFCC investigators, the judiciary and access to credible intelligence.

The EFCC Chairman also highlighted Nigeria’s non-conviction-based asset forfeiture framework, which he said enables the commission to seek forfeiture of assets suspected to be proceeds of crime without waiting for a criminal conviction.

According to him, the approach had resulted in the forfeiture of an aircraft, a university, estates and houses suspected to have been acquired with proceeds of crime.

He specifically cited 752 housing units recovered from former Central Bank of Nigeria governor, Godwin Emefiele, as well as the investigation of former Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, SAN.

“Sometimes last year, I opened investigations upon reasonable suspicion of criminal abuse of office by the immediate past attorney-general of Nigeria. We discovered that within eight years of his being in office, we were able to trace about 57 such properties to him. We’ve been able to forfeit about 48,” he said.

The Cambridge symposium is an annual gathering of anti-corruption and economic crime experts from around the world. Olukoyede delivered his presentation on the third day of the weeklong event.