In May 2022, the nation’s socio-economic and political system was shaken to its core when the news of the suspension and subsequent arrest of the then Accountant-General of the Federation, Ahmed Idris, hit the airwaves. Idris, according to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), was initially arrested on allegations of financial misconduct bordering on the sum of N80 billion. The sum later grew to N109 billion following investigations by the anti-graft agency.
Idris, as his profile shows, had worked in the federal system for years and was at one time head of finance and accounts at the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC). He is the first defendant in a 14-count charge, including alleged gratification, abuse of office, and money laundering, and is standing trial alongside three others: his company, Mr. Godfrey Olusegun Akindele, and Mohammed Kudu Usman.
Since 2022, Idris has been having his day in court, and in line with the dictates of the Nigerian legal system, only the courts can decide when justice would be served. So, in practical terms, he is walking free despite the overhang of the financial accusation.
But the subject matter of this discourse is not whether Idris is guilty or innocent. The law of the land presumes that one is innocent until proven guilty by a court of competent jurisdiction. The take here is really about the length of time the legal system devotes to the search for justice and the danger that such delay portends to societal wellbeing.
While EFCC officials and the commission’s lawyers were sweating to prove their findings against Idris, the man at the centre of it all is equally busy cooling off on the good side of life in Kano and Abuja as he likes. A video that went viral online recently showed him caressing a reptile in a damn-you-all pose. Even as he is yet to prove his innocence before the Mi Lords of the different courts, his conduct has continued to endanger the public, just as the allegation of graft levelled against him by the EFCC. At least we can estimate how many lives the N100 billion he allegedly looted can turn around if put to good use. His conduct amounts to someone deliberately leaving a hole in the roof of his inherited building during the rainy season or setting fire to the crops you had cultivated.
On July 28, 2025, the Managing Director of Kano Zoo, Sadik Kura Muhammad, was able to put out another fire ignited by Idris following the escape of a python from his residence in Kano. Before then, residents of Daneji and neighbouring areas, including Mandawari, Kabara, and Soron Dinki, had lived with their hearts in their mouths as news of the escape of a python from Idris’ residence in the area spread. The people were forced to keep sleepless nights to avoid untimely deaths from the wild animals. Before Muhammad’s intervention, it was reported that a lion, a crocodile, and other dangerous animals kept by Idris had created tension in the area, leading to loud complaints by the people. The Managing Director of Kano Zoo, who spoke on a local radio, had confirmed that “a python, a crocodile, and other wild animals discovered in the residence of the former Accountant-General of the Federation, Ahmed Idris, have been evacuated to the Kano Zoo following a wave of panic in surrounding communities.”
He said that the python, which escaped from Idris’ home, was safely recovered and transferred to the zoo, while the former Accountant-General voluntarily released the other wild animals to the zoo. Speaking on the development, the managing director of the zoo said: “There is a law called the Wild Animal Law, which permits individuals to keep certain wild animals in their homes. These may include endangered and non-endangered species.”
He added, “When I heard about the situation, I verified that he had a license and that the lion was still a cub, posing no harm. But once such animals reach a certain age, they must be transferred to the zoo.”
The message here, however, is not the fact that Idris had a license to keep the wild animals, the story is that after his lacklustre tenure as the nation’s chief accounting officer, when he allegedly allowed the purse to leak so profusely, he has continued to terrorise the common man within his vicinity by keeping them in the arms way. And here is a man who should either be serving his jail term or should have been pronounced innocent by the courts. I am sure the nation would apologise to him if that were the case.
But the culprit in this situation is neither Idris, the accused, nor EFCC, the prosecuting agency. The legal system that we run as a country allows almost every suspect to go untainted after committing daylight robbery! Justice delayed, they say, is justice denied. That is the story.
The question you want to ask is why Idris is still an accused person more than three years after his arrest? Why do we keep the trial of former governors who are accused of financial crimes in courts for years, running to a decade or more? And what value does the nation derive from such prolonged trials? Remember, the cost of prosecution is being borne by the nation, and then, the accused can appropriate a chunk of the allegedly stolen wealth to engage the system in a prolonged dog
The Idris scenario in Kano, like that of many high-profile corruption cases being handled by the EFCC, the ICPC, and sometimes the Police, thus presents us with a clear need for a rejig of our laws. Is there a need for special courts to prosecute corruption cases? I say yes to that because it would ensure speedy consummation of trials and enable a free man to walk tall in society while the guilty is made to have his day in the jailhouse. But can we have that in no time? I doubt it. With many ex-governors landing in the senate, where the law would be made.
If the charges against Idris are anything to go by, his indiscretion in office has denied many innocent Nigerians life-saving drugs, good roads, and other good things of life. But the legal system still ensured he is out there, causing further danger to innocent citizens, years after his hand was caught in the pot.
Some time ago, I had written on this page that we may not need to put the former governors who are seen to run foul of financial crimes through trial because of the prolonged drama around such prosecutions. At the end of the day, more resources, probably equalling the size of the allegedly stolen funds, are wasted on prosecutions that eventually get the accused a pat on the wrist. Maybe we just find a way to collect a sizeable amount from the stolen sum and enter into a non-disclosure agreement with such accused, rather than continue in the courts for a decade and then get a justice that would, in true sense, amount to injustice. In a reformed system, Idris would have been made to refund at least two-thirds of the sum he is being accused of looting, and then the country would find a good use for that money.
Nothing indeed calls attention to the need to review our anti-graft laws more than the prolonged trial period and the fact that such accused can still stand in elections and hold offices because the law permits that they are innocent until proven guilty. If we look at what is happening these days, we will need to give huge flowers to someone like former Senate President Adolphus Wabara, who in the year 2005, was accused by former President Olusegun Obasanjo of complicity in the bribe-for-budget scandal that rocked the Senate and the House of Representatives. The man simply resigned his position and offered to clear his name. Though it took him years to do that, he eventually won the battle, and today, he is serving as the Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). He even went back to school to earn a Ph.D. If the Wabara example were to be followed through, someone like Godswill Akpabio would not be occupying the seat of Senate President today, because the EFCC had commenced his prosecution over alleged money laundering the tune of N108 billion in 2015. It is not on record that Akpabio had discharged himself of that allegation.
In a ThisDay newspaper publication of May 24, 2023, a group by the name Network Against Corruption and Trafficking (NACAT) alleged that Akpabio diverted the sum of N700 billion from the coffers of Akwa-Ibom State while he served as its chief executive. The group’s Executive Director, Investigation, Samson Tega, and Operational Manager, Stanley Ugagbe, at a media briefing in Abuja, also said that a few months after leaving office, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) apprehended Akpabio over allegations of looting of the Akwa-Ibom State treasury to the tune of over N100 billion. None of such allegations prevented the South-South lawmaker from serving as minister in the administration of the acclaimed MaiGaskiya, the late President Muhammadu Buhari, or occupying the seat of Senate President, the third most important office in the land as we speak.
So, rather than keep endangering the lives of the diligent investigators of the EFCC, the Police and the Independent Corrupt Practices and other Related Crimes Commission (ICPC), in carrying out investigations that may not celebrate their expertise, why won’t the nation find a better way out-fully operationalise the plea-bargaining option-and insert clauses in it to ensure that whoever is so indicted (even under the table) would not be able to hold office for at least ten years. Doing that, I guess, would help the course of justice for the accused, the bleeding nation, and detectives, who sacrifice so many hours digging out the buried crimes.
Published by the Sunday Tribune, August 10, 2025).
