The 2023 presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Mr. Peter Obi, has called for the strategic investment of the ₦853 billion recovered by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to address critical challenges, including poverty, insecurity, and illiteracy.
Obi commended the EFCC for its anti-corruption efforts, however, he emphasised that what truly matters beyond the recovery is the utilisation of the funds in a verifiable and accountable manner, specifically in the critical areas such as development, health, education, and poverty alleviation to benefit the people.
Obi‘s remarks came on Friday after the Commission announced that it had recovered ₦853 billion from crime proceeds within one year.
“The Commission deserve our commendation for this effort, even though we are aware it’s just a tiny fraction of the funds looted from the public treasury by the leaders. Nigerians want to see impact. We must be able to trace where and how these recovered funds are invested.
“Currently, we have over 20 million out-of-school children in the country, the highest in the world. Similarly, we have the highest number of acute poor in the world, over a hundred million. In both cases, it is worse in the North, and all efforts toward reducing the situation remain imperative. If these recovered funds and subsequent ones are strategically invested, they would immensely contribute to breaking the cycle of poverty, illiteracy, and insecurity,” he stated.
Obi cited the Federal Government’s 2024 operational budget for Universal Basic Education, which stood at about ₦251.47 billion, noting that tripling this sum would require an additional ₦503 billion.
The politician advised: “The remaining ₦350 billion can be shared directly to 19 Northern provinces for lending micro credit to the poor. Most of these states have long been applying for as little as ₦2 billion of similar funding from our development banks.”
He appealed that this should not just be another announcement of recovery but the beginning of a new era of accountability, where every kobo retrieved is turned into classrooms, hospitals, skills, and opportunities for ordinary Nigerians.
