Economic Confidential, August 11 2008

NEWS UPDATE

EFCC Beams Searchlight on Contractors and Consultants

Not only public institutions and their officers are going to be closely monitored against corrupt practices, private firms and consultants that patronize government bodies for supplies and executions of projects would now be scrutinized as well.

In fact in a finding by the Economic Confidential, it is discovered that the new development is a departure from the past insinuation that tagged only public institutions, civil servants and political office holders as the most corrupt while in reality the major culprits in such corrupt deals are mostly contractors and consultants who provide proposal and entice the operators in the system.

It has also been discovered that private firms and contractors that were used in corrupt practices always went scot-free.

To address the unwholesome behaviours of private companies, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC has begun moves to obtain a list of all Federal contractors working with federal ministries and parastatals with a view to keeping a tab on them.

According to the spokesperson of the anti-corruption agency, Femi Babafemi, already, letters requesting all federal ministries and parastatals to furnish the commission with the list of registered contractors, all contracts awarded in the last four (4) years, amount of contract (s) awarded to these contractors, status of the contract (s) and any other relevant information, have been sent to Ministers and Heads of parastatals and agencies in this regard.

It was disclosed that the step is being taken in line with the provisions of part II, section 6 of the EFCC Act 2004.

The decision to obtain this list of federal contractors is also a follow-up to the discoveries of the various probes that multi-million naira contracts were awarded to contractors who were neither registered with the corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) nor the awarding government ministries or parastatals.

At the end of its findings, the commission also intends to advise government appropriately on award of contracts.