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Fixing The Future, a civil society organization, has asked that President-elect Bola Tinubu, Vice President-elect Kashim Shettima, incoming governors, and other public officials reveal their assets before their inauguration on May 29.
The group also pointed out that public officials’ spouses and unmarried children under the age of 21 are required by the Code of Conduct Bureau Act to report their assets.
The FTF said the Assets Declaration Compliance Survey it conducted revealed that “about 94 per cent of public officials in Nigeria do not comply with the provisions of Section 15 (1) (c) of the CCB and Code of Conduct Tribunal Acts on full disclosure of assets and liabilities.”
The Executive Director of the FTF, Stanley Ekpa, at a press conference in Abuja, on Monday, emphasised that politicians should ensure full compliance with the provisions of the extant laws on assets declaration.
Ekpa said, “We want to draw the attention of public officials to the fact that the law requires all public officials, their spouses, and their unmarried children under the age of 21 to declare their assets and liabilities, in the asset declaration forms as prescribed by the Code of Conduct Bureau.
“The cost of corruption is staggering. Of the approximately $13tn that governments spend on public projects across Africa, more than 45 per cent is lost to contract corruption. Data from the African Union shows that Nigeria loses over $7bn to corruption annually. At the continental level, it is estimated at $140bn, a figure that is equivalent to the GDP of all but five countries in Africa.