EFCC Chair: Nigeria Spent N6trn in Fight against Terrorism

Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mr. Abdulrasheed Bawa, said yesterday that Nigeria had spent N6 trillion in prosecuting the war against insurgency.

He said Nigeria lost N5.7 trillion to tax evasion by multinational companies even as the anti-graft agency recovered N6 billion, over $161 million, £13,000 and €1,730, 200 since assumption of office.

Bawa spoke while presenting a paper entitled, ‘Combating of Crime, Corruption and implication for Development and Security’, at the 38th Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crime, organised by the Center for International Documentation on Organised and Economic Crime (CIDOEC), Jesus College, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom.

Citing a report by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), he said “resources that could support a country’s development are lost through criminal acts like corruption, tax evasion, money laundering, and others.”

The EFCC Chair, according to a statement by the commission, said the absence of substantial improvement in the living condition of the people in Africa and the rest of the developing countries in spite of their natural resources endowment could be blamed on pervasive economic crimes taking place in these countries.

“The incidence of illegal mining, smuggling of goods, tax evasion, illegal oil bunkering, illegal arms deals just to mention but a few does not allow the government to receive the full accruals from the continent’s vast resources that are needed for development.

“The revenue generated are embezzled by government officials and their collaborators in the private sector. This does not allow for economic growth and by extension a hindrance to development,” he said.

Speaking on the Nigerian experience, Bawa disclosed that “over N6 trillion has been expended so far on the war against terrorism in Nigeria since 2008 while about N5.4 trillion was lost to tax evasion by multi-national corporations operating in the country from 2011 – 2021.