By Lambert Tyem
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), yesterday, sacked 33 of its officers for alleged corruption. According to a source at the agency, there is also “massive re-deployment” as several officers are being re-deployed to the Nigerian Police Force.
The source said the commission confirmed that as a way of repositioning the anti-graft agency and ridding it of ineffective operatives, 33 EFCC officers, who were seconded from the police, have been sent away from the commission.
He said the redeployment affected two Assistant Commissioners of Police (ACP), six Chief Superintendents of Police (CSP), five Superintendents of Police (SP), 10 Deputy Superintendents of Police (DSPs), nine Assistant Superintendents of Police (ASPs), and one police inspector.
The source added that some of the officers being redeployed either have disciplinary issues or have been inept in the discharge of their duties.
“The officers affected are those with questionable records, and those with pending disciplinary problems,” our source said.
The commission’s chairman, Mr. Lamorde had during his confirmation by the Senate alleged that some EFCC operatives were corrupt. He said that his commission planned to purchase a lie detector machine to be used on all EFCC staff.
“Orders have been placed for those machines, but they are yet to arrive,” said Wilson Uwujaren, the spokesman for the EFCC who declined to comment on the official reasons for the re-deployment of the operatives.
While sending the 33 officers away, the EFCC chairman also requested the Inspector General of Police, Mohammed Abubakar, to redeploy new officers to the commission.
In what appears to be a response to the EFCC chairman’s request, Mr. Abubakar authorised the redeployment of the affected officers.
Established in 2004, the EFCC gets a large chunk of its workforce from the Nigerian Police on temporal basis, while others are directly recruited by the commission from the public. The three heads of the commission since inception have also been serving or former police officers.
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