The African Democratic Congress (ADC) has cried out, alleging a witch-hunt as the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) goes after some of its key chieftains.
Raising the alarm on Tuesday, the party wondered why the anti-graft agency is coming for David Mark more than 10 years after he left office as President of the Senate.
Mark, who served as President of the Senate from 2007 to 2015 on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), became the National Chairman of the ADC opposition coalition last July.
The ADC also wondered why E. Emeka Ihedioha, who served as Imo State governor for seven months, ending January 2020, could suddenly be of interest to the EFCC.
The party similarly could not fathom the reason behind the current detention by the Commission of Aminu Tambuwal, who left office as governor of Sokoto State in May 2023.
Tambuwal and Ihedioha are chieftains of the Mark-led ADC, which has sworn to defeat President Bola Tinubu and his All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2027.
Joining the lamentations is former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, who described the EFCC’s actions as a continuation of Tinubu’s agenda to harass, intimidate and decimate the opposition.
In a statement on Tuesday by the spokesman of the ADC, Bolaji Abdullahi, the party said it has become crystal clear that the EFCC is out on a hatchet job.
It described the actions of the anti-graft agency as a choreographed media trial targeted at bringing coalition leaders to disrepute.
The opposition party asked the EFCC to leave the ruling party to fight its political battles, as it decried the pattern of ignoring APC stalwarts with fresher and well-documented corruption cases.
Describing the cases against the three prominent ADC chieftains as “stale allegations”, the party said the EFCC’s actions are proof of selective justice and an assault on political freedom.
Further deploring what it termed a coordinated assault on the opposition figures, it was meant to discredit them through media trials.
“As shown in an EFCC correspondence currently circulating online, the Commission has now embarked on the investigation of another coalition chieftain, former Imo Governor Emeka Ihedioha, with an ‘urgent’ request to the officials to provide information related specifically to his brief seven months in office.
“Most notably, the EFCC has now surreptitiously started excavating all the files from the ADC Chairman, Senator David Mark’s tenure as President of the Nigerian Senate.
“Let us remind Nigerians that our party chairman, Senator Mark, served as the Senate President for eight years, from June 6, 2007, to June 6, 2015 — making him the longest-serving Senate President in our history.
“He left office 10 years and two months ago. Three Senate Presidents later, the EFCC suddenly remembered that he was a Senate President.
“While the ADC, as a party, stands for adherence to the rule of law and due process, like all Nigerians, we question the curious timing, selective targets, and political motivations that now seem to define the EFCC’s actions.
“A fight against corruption that begins and ends with the opposition is not justice — it is persecution. We have no doubts that this is witch-hunting; it is the APC government weaponising anti-corruption to do its political battle.
“Having failed to stop the coalition, the jittery ruling party’s next move is to discredit its leaders by getting the EFCC to accuse them of looting the entire treasury.
“These are calculated media trials, which start and end with the accusation, the scandal, and the consequent lowering of public estimation. It matters little whether there is a basis for these accusations — the game is the circus show.
“The questions write themselves: why now? Why these men? Why these timelines? If corruption truly has no statute of limitation, why are the EFCC’s files on APC’s own ‘big men’, many with fresher, documented cases, gathering dust in forgotten drawers? Why does the EFCC only discover ‘urgent’ anti-corruption zeal when an opposition leader becomes a political threat?
“The truth is simple. These are not fresh investigations — they are political manoeuvres, cynical attempts to intimidate and weaken credible opposition voices ahead of the 2027 elections.
“The APC’s EFCC does not touch its own while they are in office or when they defect to the ruling party. Once a former governor crosses over, their files vanish like morning dew,” the ADC stated.
The party asked what had become of the EFCC’s corruption investigation of a former Delta State Governor, Ifeanyi Okowa, before he defected from the PDP to the ADC last April.
“Since Ifeanyi Okowa joined the APC, have Nigerians heard a single whisper from the EFCC about his cases? Yet opposition leaders are hounded with allegations from decades past without a shred of new evidence.
“Let this be on record: what the EFCC is doing on behalf of the APC government is anti-democracy. Every time the EFCC is deployed as a political bulldog, it tramples on public trust and shreds the credibility of our justice system,” it added.
The ADC reminded the ruling party that state institutions do not belong to the APC, saying, rather, they belong to Nigerians.
The opposition coalition called on Nigerians to speak up, to resist, and to demand that the EFCC stop the witch-hunt in the interest of the nation’s democracy.
“Today, it is David Mark, Ihedioha, and Tambuwal. Tomorrow, it could be anyone who dares to hold this government accountable,” it said.
In a separate statement, Atiku vowed the coalition will never succumb to the anti-democratic machinations of railroading Nigeria into a one-party dictatorship
According to him, the only reason the EFCC detained Tambuwal was simply because he is a member of the opposition coalition.
“It is a continuation of the Tinubu-led administration’s agenda to harass, intimidate, and decimate the opposition.
“The reality unfolding before us today is that the Tinubu administration, as with other aspects, has objectified the fight against corruption as a political tool to coerce opposition leaders into the ruling party.
“We are living witnesses to a growing trend where the state and its operators have assumed the roles of a bully by making corruption and the fight against it a political agenda.
“Certainly, that is not the objective for which I worked hard during our administration to create the EFCC,” he said.
Recall that Atiku was the vice president to former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who established the EFCC during his tenure.
Continuing, Atiku said, “It is as though today, anyone who associates with the opposition is a target for phantom corruption allegations, and it is as though, as soon as they are coerced into the political agenda of President Tinubu, their ‘sins’ are forgiven.
“That, definitely, is not how to build institutions. That, certainly, is not how to fight the monster of corruption. Indeed, such tendencies provide the stimulant for corruption to thrive.
“We have seen how the EFCC has been used to empty opposition state governors into the ruling party, and the tea party is not about to end anytime soon.
“While the genuine fight against corruption is a matter that requires the total support of all Nigerians, the objectification of it as a political agenda should be roundly condemned by all in civil society spaces and friends of Nigeria in the international community.
“We have in recent times witnessed the use of anti-corruption agencies in coercing political leaders into the ruling party. Our assurance to Nigerians is that we would never succumb to these anti-democratic machinations of railroading our people into a one-party dictatorship.”
