By Cajetan Mmuta
Members of the International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (InterSociety), a civil society organization (CSO), Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) Anambra state council, and monarch of Umueri in Anambra East local government area, Igwe Ben Emeka have blasted the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for the embarrassment caused immediate past Governor Willie Obiano by detaining him over alleged N42billion misappropriation.

Chairman of the InterSociety, Comrade Emeka Umeagbalasi in a statement made available to newsmen on Monday said it was wrong for the EFCC to keep Chief Obiano in long detention over mismanagement of funds belonging to the state.

The Anambra monarch and the NUJ condemned the continuous detention of ex-Governor Obiano,

The Traditional Ruler of Umueri, Anambra East Local Government Area, Anambra State, Igwe Ben Emeka, in his reaction on Monday, urged EFCC to quickly free the immediate past governor of the State, Chief Willie Obiano.

Emeka, who wondered why a former governor would be arrested without a formal invitation, noted that it amounted to humiliation and victimization.

The monarch, who spoke when he received the state executive of Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) on courtesy call in his palace, enjoined other leaders from the South East region to join hands in demanding Obiano’s urgent release.

He said, “Journalism is a very good profession and a tool with which people get to know what is happening in the world. We want many people to support in calling on EFCC to free Obiano. It is a humiliation and victimization on? someone who worked in Anambra. We know all the good works he did for Anambra. We are not complaining. Besides, they did not invite him. So, why are they humiliating him. Why should they also go after the governor’s wife.? Is she a civil servant.?

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“Aside from the international Airport he built, he paid civil servants very prompt until he left office. But we have other governors all over the country who don’t pay workers. So many former Governors and corrupt leaders are going round around the streets without any hindrances. But they go after a good man. Obiano knows the conditions of workers and the facts they buy from the same markets where prices of commodities have risen,” he stated.

Chairman of the NUJ, Anambra State Council, Dr. Odogwu Emeka Odogwu, in his speech condemned the arrest and continuous detention of former governor Obiano and urged EFCC to release him and follow due process in trying him instead of media trial

Also, Comrade Umeagbalasi said, “It is the position of the Int’l Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission does not need and is not required by law to keep former Gov Obiano in long detention over mismanagement of Anambra’s billions.

Umeagbalasi who referred to sections 46 and 7 of the EFCC Acr, noted that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission and its Act deals with ‘non-violent criminal and illicit activity or activities involving public officers, former public officers, individual citizens and body corporates including social enterprises.

According to the NGO, economic and Financial Crimes, therefore, are paper, electronic, and property-based traceable crimes, otherwise called “White-Collar or Bureaucratic/Institutional Crimes”. In other words, their pieces of evidence and proofs are easily traceable or can easily be assembled.

He said, “Instances include money laundering or stashing away of public funds, onshore or offshore acquisition of choice and questionable properties while holding office in public governance, ostentatious lifestyles or lifestyles that are far above the income of a public office holder or immediate past public office holder, gross disparity between the paper and field contents of the pre-public office occupation asset declarations and their post public office occupation asset declarations, misappropriation and misapplication of public funds or diversion of public funds such as Local Government allocated funds which never reflect in the State Appropriation and Supplementary Appropriation Laws; etc.”

He pointed out that “In the case of former Gov Obiano, EFCC has no legal business holding him in long detention as doing so diminishes the EFCC competence and marks same out as economic and financial crimes commission of crude and typewriter age or era.”

“Long detention also does not offer competence in criminal investigations regarding crimes of economic and financial nature. Under Section 35 of the 1999 Constitution, long detention such as a maximum sixty to ninety days detention is factored within the confines of arresting and detaining suspects alleged to have committed offenses bordering on capital punishments especially serious crimes of premeditated homicide or murder, terrorism, armed robbery, abduction, and treason; all for purposes of complex criminal investigations,” the group stated.

Umeagbalasi further explained, “It is a settled law in Nigeria that no offense under Economic and Financial Crimes is a capital punishment warranting long detention for purpose of “man-machine-mental” investigations.”

“Therefore, holding former Gov Obiano for long in detention which is entering its fifth day, may end up being counter-productive and expose EFCC as incompetence, crude, draconian and lawless anti-graft agency,” he said.

“Consequently, the only substance of new Gov Soludo’s position on Obiano and EFCC is that detaining him long is unnecessary. However, we beg to disagree with the new Gov and former Sen Victor Umeh on their perceived impression that suggests that “Obiano is a saintly former Anambra Gov”.

“The new Gov must also watch his back and utterances and focus on his new task of governing the State. He must also learn a big lesson from the self-inflicted travail of the former Gov and leave the former Gov to carry his cross or burden so invited.”

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“The greatest humiliation done to the former Gov was his arrest hours after he handed over as he was escaping the shores of the country. His ordeal started when he was recently placed locally and internationally on a watchlist by the Government of Nigeria over strong suspicion of offending or breaching the Economic and Financial Crimes Act of the Federation 2004, among others.”

He said, “Contrary to wrong impressions in certain privileged quarters, releasing the former Anambra Gov from EFCC is not the end of his self invited and inflicted cross or ordeal. Rather, by his arrest and detention hours after he left office, the former Gov has made himself locally and internationally inescapable and a guest for sundry investigations on anti-graft crimes. He is also morally damned and impeccably ruined both locally and internationally.”

“The EFCC must therefore free him conditionally and investigative or judicially ban him from traveling outside the country pending the conclusion of his investigation or prosecution. Other deterrent measures against him must include seizing his international passports and placing his family members under watchlist and expediting processes of investigation and prosecution against him,” the body added.