Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has stated that Nigeria’s anti-corruption campaign is derailing into a political witch-hunt.
Atiku warned that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and other anti-graft agencies risk losing public trust unless they purge themselves of partisan influence.
He said in a statement issued by his media office in Abuja on Thursday that the arrest and detention of Abubakar Malami, former attorney-general of the federation, showed that the EFCC was drifting from its founding principles.
He said the agency was created to uphold justice but was now “weaponising its powers to serve narrow political agendas.”
He said, “The politicisation of corruption investigations has rendered the EFCC’s credibility suspect and rubbished the very ideals that inspired its establishment.”
Atiku accused the EFCC of selective investigations that target opposition figures, including Malami.
He said the pattern of arrests suggested that the commission had become an overzealous extension of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
Atiku said the EFCC became unusually active when the African Democratic Congress (ADC) emerged as an opposition force.
He said the agency launched what he described as coordinated attacks on figures such as Malami and Aminu Waziri Tambuwal.
He said the commission had ignored corruption allegations involving allies of the ruling party, adding that some former governors with outstanding corruption cases were appointed as ministers and ambassadors by President Bola Tinubu.
“We expected the EFCC to voice its objection to the appointment of former governors with unresolved corruption allegations. But partisan loyalty prevailed over integrity.
“Had Malami joined the APC, the EFCC would have left him untouched, even if he had looted the entire CBN vault,” he said.
He said Nigerians were witnessing an agency that had turned itself into a tool for intimidating and destabilising the opposition.
“The EFCC, now operating like a political rottweiler, is deployed to intimidate and coerce politicians into joining the APC. And once they bow to pressure, their corruption cases mysteriously vanish,” Atiku stated.
Atiku said no serious nation fights corruption by sacrificing the independence of its oversight institutions, even as he urged the EFCC leadership to detach the agency from political manipulation and safeguard its integrity.
He said the stakes were too high for the anti-graft commission to trade its credibility for partisan interests.
