The former head of the Physical Planning Division at the Federal College of Education, Asaba, Ameh Joseph Eche, has appealed to President Muhammadu Buhari, to intervene over what he described as victimization for exposing corruption in the institution.
In a letter, Joseph alleged that ‘the institution remains enmeshed in deep rooted corrupt practices with far-reaching consequences of not only economic and financial nature but with serious potentials of massive loss of lives.
He also noted, he has tried to call attention to victimization with several acknowledged letters to the Presidency, the OMBUDSMAN, ICPC, and the Federal Civil Service Commission. Despite assurances of intervention, nothing has been done.
Narrating his ordeal, he said;
“Ever since my appointment as head of the physical planning division in 2011, I have suffered all manner of intimidation, victimization, the threat of and actual physical harm to my life and finally termination of my appointment in May 2020 for daring to refuse to support these unprofessional practices and massive corruption .”
He further alleged in the letter that the institution’s director of works and other top university staff have been involved in malpractices which he has constantly registered his objection against. Joseph also revealed that in a bid to ensure that the issues he raised were tackled internally, he exhausted the internal mechanism for complaints in memos dated June 12, 2019, and 2nd July 2019
The whistleblower alleging foul play in his letters indicted the Independent Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences Commission for allegedly conniving with the management of the college to victimize him.
The embattled Joseph accused the current Provost of the College Dr. (Mrs.) Anene Okeakwa of relieving him of his job despite investigations by the ICPC bothering on allegations of corruption in the institution.
In a letter written to the Architects Council of Nigeria by the former head of Physical Planning had alleged that procedures were not followed in the area of building and design in the Institution.
In another letter addressed to the ICPC, sighted by Dataphyte, Mr. Joseph had informed the commission of ‘attempts at victimizing him’ after ‘exposing’ financial abuses and corruption in the institution.
In the letter, he expressed worry that his identity as the person who exposed the corruption in the institution was revealed.
In another letter to the commission, he called their attention to his removal after his identity was revealed as the Whistleblower in the institution. He sought intervention while noting that in the space of two weeks after personnel of the commission visited the institution, he had received at least ten queries over what he described as “an attempt to silence him”
He also noted that he approached the National Industrial Court but despite this, the provost went ahead to terminate his appointment without regard for due process or the law in 2020.
“Battling with the court case while waiting for the intervention of ICPC, the investigations were concluded and the 3 members of staff petitioned in petition volume 1 were found culpable. I sent a reminder letter to the ICPC chairman via the lead investigator but the response received by recorded delivery was that ICPC can not intervene at this point because the case is already in court and ICPC that ought to serve some witness appears not willing.”
While expressing disappointment at how the case has been treated, he further stated that carrying the burden of exposing corruption alone has become too much for him to bear.
What are the provisions of Nigeria’s Whistleblower policy?
The Nigerian Whistleblowing policy law requires public employees to disclose information in the public interest, including those related to mismanagement, gross waste of funds, fraud, abuse of authority, and public health and safety dangers.
When a Whistleblower exposes a financial fraud, he or she is entitled to within 2.5-5% of the recovered funds.
However, there have been concerns about the availability of laws to protect whistle-blowers, especially from retaliation.
There have been efforts toward enacting an Act aimed at protecting Whistleblowers in the country.
In 2017, the Nigerian Senate passed the Whistleblowers protection bill. Some of the provisions of the bill included wearing a mask, receiving protection from authorities, use of pseudo-names among others. The bill was however not signed into law by Nigerian President, Muhammadu Buhari.
The Senate reintroduced the bill in 2019 after declining Presidential assent to the 2017 effort. However, as of the time of this report, the bill remains unpassed, meaning that there is no legal provision in the form of an Act for protecting whistleblowers in the country.
Importance of Whistleblowing in Nigeria’s Quest Against Corruption
Transparency International described Whistleblowing as one of the most effective ways to detect, prevent corruption and other malpractices.
The Security Sector Integrity described Whistleblowing as an important tool to exposing wrongdoings that threaten public health and safety, abuse of authority, unauthorized use of public funds among others.
The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development noted that encouraging ‘employees to report wrongdoing and protecting them once they do is important to fighting corruption
With Nigeria’s promises on many occasions to fight corruption and the poor ranking of Nigeria on corruption perception, Whistleblowing may encourage revealing corrupt practices given the importance accrued to it.
A report had revealed that Nigerians are still afraid of reporting corruption despite the Whistleblowing policy introduced in 2016.
In 2017, the Nigerian government announced that it recouped N73 billion, after different Whistleblowers’ reports. Despite these announced successes, Whistleblowers have continued to allege foul play and victimization as is the case with Mr. Joseph
What is the Presidency saying?
As of the time of this report, there is no known reaction to the letter of the embattled Joseph by the Presidency.