Former Deputy Comptroller of Immigration, Ime Unaowo Nta
By Akpan David, Calabar
A retired Deputy Comptroller of Immigration, Mr Ime Unaowo Nta has bemoaned the rate at which corruption has permeated the antigraft agencies in the country.
At an award ceremony where the Institute of Natural and Human Resources recognised his anti-graft campaigns while he was in office and presently, Nta berated the activities of the antigraft agencies in the country, saying they have rather become more corrupt than those they hunt.
Nta, who is the younger brother of Mr Ekpo Nta, the former chairman of Independent Corrupt Practices Commission, said even the Economic and Financial Crimes as Commission (EFCC) and the ICPC are bedeviled by corruption.
He lamented that President Muhammadu Buhari has been acclaimed as one reported to bent against corruption yet officials and parastatals are not exactly free of corruption.
In his lecture, Nta said the efforts of the President has fought corruption in the country to the best of his knowledge, but his antigraft agencies have failed woefully.
Nta, a former Special Assistant to the former Minister of Interior Abba Moro, who was acknowledged as the best passport control officer in the country, said the antigraft agencies have rather wasted time and resources attacking certain individuals and fellow politicians depending on which political party control the Federal Government.
“They have done this instead of gearing towards blocking conduit pipes from where the national resources are stolen”, he said.
Nta said he dedicates the award to President Buhari for his vision in the executive order to ease of doing business and the Comptroller General of Immigration for the platform to prove his worth by issuing passports within 24 hours and eliminating extortions among others which reasons earned him the best passport control officer in the country between 2017 -2020.
He said he also dedicates it to his late fatherr who was killed in his presence on 29th July, 1966 by the rebellious coup leaders for refusing to handover keys to the Agodi prison.
Also speaking, Mr Minoye Mill of the Institute of Human and Natural Resource, also called on the agencies and leaders of governments to be transparent and stop re-looting recovered loots or conniving with corrupt leaders.
