Bukola Ojeme
17 June 2008
Lagos — ABOUT 257 operatives have been penciled in for re-deployment in a major shake-up of both the senior and junior cadre at the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) as the new leadership under retired Assistant Inspector-General of Police, Mrs Farida Waziri, settles down for business.
Yesterday, spokesman for the agency, Mr Ositah Nwajah, was dropped for Mr Femi Babafemi until now of The Sun Newspaper.
The impending purge, which cuts across all cadres of the Commission's staff, Vanguard gathered, has led to panic and mutual suspicion among staff of the anti-graft agency.
Some of the Commission's staff, who discussed the impending redeployment in hushed tones at the Commission's headquarters yesterday, said some of their colleagues, desperate to stay on, had resorted to carrying tales of disloyalty to the new leadership in a deadly survival game.
At least 159 senior and junior police operatives have been penciled in for redeployment to their mother units, while a Director of the rank of Assistant Commissioner of Police is slated to be redeployed to the Force Headquarters.
Vanguard investigations revealed that Mobile Police Force personnel from Squadrons 21, 44, and 45, that have provided personal security detail for Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, as well as Lamorde, have been ordered back to their mother squadron.
A new detachment of Mobile Police Force personnel from Squadron 21 with headquarters in Nyanyan has been detailed to take control of securing Waziri, her residence and all facilities belonging to the Commission.
An embittered source who spoke on condition of anonymity to Vanguard blamed their fate on the antics of some of their colleagues, saying: "They are the ones who go about labelling us as disloyal.
Findings also revealed that a Head of Department alleged to be unfit for his present office, arising from his status as a junior staff would be redeployed to an office befitting his cadre.
At the Economic and Governance Unit of the Commission, at least five operatives, including two female investigators, believed to have lobbied their way into the unit have been penciled in for redeployment out of the Unit.
Some of the Commission's staff uncertain of their fate in the new dispensation, as learnt, are also making frantic efforts to secure appointment with multinational agencies that hitherto related with the anti-graft agency under Ribadu.
But a source close to the hierarchy of the new leadership, who did not want to be named, debunked insinuations of partiality, describing the planned purge as normal and routine posting, insisting: "The Commission, like any other security organisation, is acting in line with what is obtainable.
"The tour of duty of some of these people on secondment ought to elapse at least after six months after their initial posting, but undue favouritism and lobbying accounted for why some have remained within the EFCC system. The new management is only doing what is right. As for the position of Chief of Staff, there is nowhere in the Commission's original organogram, where you have the office of Chief of Staff to the Chairman," he added.
The source also described as unacceptable the practice by the previous administration "whereby some staffs are promoted ahead of others. This is not good for a security organisation, moreso as it could adversely affect discipline, with some seeing themselves as super staff."
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