EFCC officials arriving Bola Tinubu’s pooling unit in Lagos
Ahead of the 2023 polls which begin on Saturday, February 25, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has placed on its watch list some governors, public officials and corrupt businessmen who have allegedly stockpiled the old and new naira notes for the purpose of buying votes. The commission’s chairman, Mr. Abdulrasheed Bawa, disclosed this yesterday in an interview on Channels Television’s election programme, The 2023 Verdict.
“We have intelligence that a lot of politicians have bought some items that they will use to buy votes in kind and not in cash. But we are prepared for any situation and will not hesitate to arrest anyone caught in the act. We will watch out for all these things on election day.
“I don’t want to say only governors are hoarding naira notes; there are public servants out there doing the same thing or some businessmen with questionable characters are still having these funds in their homes.
“So, I don’t want to say governors are these, but I will say that public servants, either retired or serving and some businessmen with questionable characters are on our radar,” he said. Bawa said if Nigerians were united “we would be able to take inadequacies out of our system.”
He also announced that officers of the commission had been deployed to monitor the polls across 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory and urged citizens to report vote buying, selling, and other evidence of financial malpractices.
