The Chairman, Code of Conduct Bureau Prof. Mohammed Isah on the 2nd day of June,2021, led the Board Members and other officers of the Bureau for a courtesy call to the Chairman of ICPC Prof. Bolaji Owasanoye.
The meeting was aimed at sharing ideas on how to collaborate in the areas of information sharing, capacity building and innovations at both agencies, in order to deliver on their mandate, which is the fight against corruption.
Prof. Isah, in his speech mentioned the need for the Bureau to collaborate with ICPC as the fight against corruption in Nigeria cannot be done in isolation by any anti-corruption agency.
The Chairman CCB, also pointed out the need to conduct a thorough investigation on public officers with unexplainable wealth.
He made an observation concerning overlapping functions where in the past, a case will be investigated by several anticorruption agencies as a result of multiple petitions. He, therefore reiterated the need for inter agency collaboration.
He also sought the collaboration of ICPC in capacity building and policies that can help both agencies in discharging their functions optimally.
In his response, the Chairman of ICPC said, he was delighted to received the CCB team.
Prof. Bolaji advised the CCB Chairman and his board to look into various ways of improving the asset declaration and verification regime, such as periodic review of the form to cover emerging trends, he also advised on partnering with professional bodies in the areas of verification such as quantity surveyors and statistics. He advised on planning ahead using data and statistics because the CCB already knows the number of public servants, which can easily guide in the area of budgeting, number of cases and forms to envisage annually.
He acknowledged and praised the efforts of the current board of CCB, with all the innovations and the digitalization efforts put in place.
He also assured the CCB of his readiness to collaborate in whatever capacity they can especially in training of personnel, and the use of the ICPC forensic laboratory and investigation devices etc. He re-emphasized the need for CCB to focus on asset recovery as an enforcement measure.
He advised CCB to develop a framework within the armpit of the law that will require public officers declare their assets publicly which will tremendously strengthen the fight against corruption and aid citizen participation.