.Orders probe into allegations against him
.Signs data protection bill into law
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, GCFR, on Wednesday approved the indefinite suspension from office of Mr. AbdulRasheed Bawa, CON, as the Chairman, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to allow for proper investigation into his conduct while in office.
This follows weighty allegations of abuse of office levelled against him according to a statement by
Willie Bassey
Director, Information
at the office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation.
“Mr Bawa has been directed to immediately handover the affairs of his office to the Director, Operations in the Commission, who will oversee the affairs of the Office of the Chairman of the Commission pending the conclusion of the investigation”, the terse statement disclosed.
His removal came on the heels of suspension of Mr. Godwin Emefiele as Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN Governor and directed to immediately hand over the affairs of his office to a Deputy Governor.
Bawa was directed to handover to Director of Operation, Mohammed Aba pending the conclusion of the investigation.
CP Abba was seconded to the Commission in January 2016 to head the Counterterrorism and General Investigations, CTGI, Section at the Headquarters in Abuja.
President said this is to allow for a thorough investigation into his conduct while in office following “weighty allegations ” of abuse of office against him.
Bawa emerged EFCC Chairman following the removal of former Chairman of the Commission, Ibrahim Magu.
Recall that former governor of Zamfara state, Bello Matawalle accused the suspended EFCC boss of demanding $2 million from him.
The Man who takes over from Bawa, Mohammed Umar Abba was born on June 22, 1965, in Tudunwada Local Government Area of Kano State.
Abba bagged his first degree from Bayero University, Kano. He did his one-year national service at the old Anambra State Police Command and later got enlisted into the Nigeria Police Force. He attended the Nigeria Police Academy, Kaduna State, where he was commissioned in 1992.
Abba was appointed the Director of Operations of the Commission in 2017.
In 2019, he was promoted to the rank of Commissioner of Police.
On July 9, 2020, Abba stepped in as the Acting Chairman of the Commission, being the most senior operational officer when the former chairman, Ibrahim Magu, was suspended.
In the past few months over 130 notable anti-corruption civil society organizations have renewed their call for the resignation of the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, AbdulrasheedBawa, for alleged politicization of the Commission, disobedience of court orders, and violation of Nigerians’ human rights, among other things.
The activists who were joined by over 20 Constitutional lawyers, led by Barr. Mogbojuri Kayode of the Citizens Rights Advocacy Group, noted that the desperation of Bawa to save his face after dishonourable acts in office had taken a laughable turn, insisting that no amount of “purchased CSOs’ vote of confidence” would cover the truth about the abnormalities being condoned in EFCC under its current leadership.
They spoke at a joint press conference in Lagos.
According to them, the EFCC has become so desperate to launder what they called a rapidly diminishing image of Bawa, to the extent that the Commission’s spokesman laughably signed a Press Release, recently, informing Nigerians that a Civil Society Organization had passed a vote of confidence in its chairman.
“Isn’t it the job of the media to see that and independently report?” they asked.
The leaders of the struggle said it was a thing of honour that, despite the immense pressure mounted on leaders of the “Bawa Must Go” protests to abandon their objective cause, over 120 of the main actors had remained resolute while more had joined in the interest of the rule of law.
But the Anti-corruption activists, commended President Muhammadu Buhari for bailing the country out of what they described as a Judicial quagmire “by dissociating the Presidency from any act of disobedience to court orders and making the Central Bank of Nigeria comply with a Supreme Court order that extended the validity of old naira notes till December 31, 2023.”
“As this is expected to ease the pain of the masses, we hereby call on the President to also wade into the seeming fixation of the EFCC on certain individuals and the desperation of the Chairman of the Commission to score cheap political goals through unwarranted media trials of non-convicted individuals in the country. He should direct Mr. Bawa to step aside until he purges himself of contempt as ruled by a High Court,” Spokesperson for the Coalition, Olufemi Lawson, said in a speech delivered on behalf of the activists.
Chairman, Centre for Anti-corruption and Open Leadership, CACOL, Debo Adeniran, specifically noted that his organisation had, from the outset, alerted the National Assembly to the fact that Bawa was unfit for the post of EFCC chairman, over alleged corrupt practices and his rumoured relationship with the Attorney-General of the Federation who was believed to have masterminded the travails and eventually removal of Bawa’s predecessor, Ibrahim Magu.
According to him, Bawa’s alleged misconduct in office is a confirmation of CACOL’s fears of his being a misfit for the position.
Adeniran, who made copies of CACOL’s initial objection to Bawa’s appointment available to the press, said, “Up till now, he (Bawa) has not cleared himself of all the allegations against him and he has been made to catch other people who committed offences that are not as grievous as the ones that he has been accused of. And on top of all of these, he has been behaving as if he is an authority to himself. And we are now saying that, no matter how highly placed you are, no matter how influential you are, you still are duty-bound to operate within the confines of the laws of our own country. That is the Constitution.
“Nobody is above the law. Everybody should be equal before the law. If we don’t allow the rule of law to govern our society, then we are plunging our society into that kingdom where anarchy rules, where there will be chaos and where there will be no control over who does what, and that would be a disorganised society.
“This man has been convicted about two times for flagrant disobedience of court orders. The Inspector-General of Police has been lagging behind in the performance of his duty in this regard, may be because of what they believe should be esprit de corps. Gradually, other agencies would not want to obey the rule of law.
The ‘Bawa Must Go’ protests are being led by CACOL Chairman, Debo Adeniran; Executive Director, Zero Graft Centre, Kolawole Sanchez-Jude; Chairman, Coalition Against Corruption and Bad Governance, Toyin Raheem; Executive Director, Centre for Public Accountability, Olufemi Lawson; Spokesperson for the Transparency and Accountability Group, Ayodeji Ologun; Director, Activists for Good Governance, Declan Ihehaire; and Ahmed Balogun of Media Rights Concern, among over 120 notable leaders of Anti-corruption CSOs.
Tinubu signs Data Protection Bill Into Law
President Bola Tinubu, on Monday, signed the Data Protection Bill into law.
This was contained in a statement signed by the Head, Legal Enforcement and Regulations, Nigeria Data Protection Bureau, Babatunde Bamigboye.
The NDPB National Commissioner, Dr Vincent Olatunji, expressed optimism on the prospects of Nigeria’s Digital Economy following the emerging regulatory dispensation.
He applauded the president for renewing the hope of over 200 million Nigerians in the advancement of privacy rights and other fundamental freedoms both in cyberspace and in analogue transactions,
The statement read in part, “Nigeria has taken a giant leap forward in the global data race with the assent to Nigeria Data Protection Act by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. The Act was signed on the 12th of June 2023.
“The NDPB, pursuant to the express provisions of the new act, has transmuted into a full-fledged commission and it is mandated to among others:
(a) regulate the deployment of technological and organisational measures to enhance personal data protection;
(b) foster the development of personal data protection technologies, in accordance with recognised international best practices and applicable international law;
conduct investigations into any violation of a requirement under the Act;
(c) impose penalties in respect of any violation of the provisions of the Act or subsidiary legislation made thereof;
(d) where necessary, accredit, license, and register suitable persons to provide data protection compliance services;
(e) issue regulations, rules, directives and guidance under the Act; and
(f) register data controllers and data processors of major importance.”
The bureau further disclosed that the act is one of the strategic ways the president is fulfilling his campaign promise of creating 1 million jobs in the digital economy sector.
About 500,000 jobs are expected to be created through the training of data protection officers and licensing of data protection compliance organisations to offer services to data controllers and processors.
