ADA (OSUN)- The EFCC Chairman, Mrs Farida Waziri, has charged law-enforcement agents to eschew corruption in the discharge of their duties.
Waziri made the call while delivering a paper entitled “The Rule of Law and the Challenges of Law Enforcement” at the Police Service Commission retreat in Ada, Osun.
She said that if law-enforcement agents were able to adopt an anti-corruption stance, such position would help them to contribute positively to the country’s development in a pragmatic way.
“It is only when corruption is eschewed that Nigeria can achieve any meaningful development,” Waziri said, noting:
“Corruption has practically crippled the nation.”
She stressed that policemen and other security operatives had important roles to play in the ongoing fight against corruption.
“The police are direct agents of economic development, it is in the interest of the police to ensure that they directly work within the parameters of the law.
“‘They should also promote the rule of law in all their activities,” she said.
Waziri, however, criticised law enforcement officers who often compromised professionalism by extorting money from complainants or suspects.
She bemoaned such practice, saying that it was not only condemnable but also arbitrary and antithetical to the tenets of the rule of law.
The EFCC chief said that even though the police were nation-builders, they should, nonetheless, reject the Napoleonic motto which says “he who builds a nation breaks no law”.
“The rule of law espouses the supremacy of the law,” she said, urging the police to refrain from taking any illegal actions.
|
