The Permanent Secretary, Special Duties, Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Dr Muhammed K. Dikwa. mni, has revealed that the Federal Government has recovered ₦594.09 billion from whistleblowing policy since its inception in 2016.
Dr. Dikwa noted that the Federal Government decided to introduce the policy in order to fight corruption, and other financial crimes, like violation of the Treasury Single Account (TSA), elimination of ghost workers syndrome, staff collecting double salaries in more than one organization, retirees without proper records but still collecting salaries, recoveries of salaries from retired diplomats for almost two years to the tune of ₦192m, non remittances by MDAs, amongst other crimes, adding that, the policy has drastically reduced corruption in both civil and criminal cases.
On the challenges encountered during the course of implementing the policy, the Permanent Secretary highlighted lack of proper legal framework, poor funding, lack of coordination and diverse information among relevant organisations, not following the proper channel to give information, adding that, sometimes information given was fake, which however contradicts investigations.
Charting the way forward, Dr Dikwa said the whistleblowing and witness protection bill 2019, was being put together to make the policy effective and provide legal backing/administrative guide. He, therefore, urged the participants to critically review the draft bill and make additional inputs to be forward same to the National Assembly for passage and enactment.
The Permanent Secretary said the whistleblowing policy which is a work in progress has come to stay. He urged the participants to work assiduously towards legalizing and institutionalizing the whistleblowing policy to meet international best practices which another comity of nations have adopted over the years.
