WE CANT PUBLISH BUHARI, OSINBAJO’S ASSESTS- CCB

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 The Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB) yes­terday explained it could not make public the assets declara­tion of President Muham­madu Buhari, Vice Presi­dent, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo (SAN) and other public of­fice holders because the enabling law under which it operates, does not permit the agency to do so.

However, the CCB said it would soon forward a bill to the Eighth National Assembly seeking to allow Nigerians to have access to assets declara­tion of public officers.

The bureau disclosed this yesterday at the anti-corrup­tion seminar organized by the Nigerian Bar Association [NBA] in Abuja.

Secretary of the CCB, Mr. Kolade Omoyola, who spoke as a representative of the Chairman, Mr. Sam Saba, explained that the Constitu­tion only allows the bureau to keep records of the assets declaration of public office holders.

President Buhari and Vice President Osinbajo had sub­mitted their assets declara­tion forms separately to the bureau. However, the con­tents of the forms were not disclosed.

The development immedi­ately sparked public outcry over the failure of Buhari and Osinbajo to publicly declare their assets as promised by them during their campaigns.

Specifically, some civil society groups and activ­ists, championed by the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP), the Civil Societ­ies Legislative and Advocacy Centre, Ebun-Olu Adegboru­wa and Smart Ajaja, have demanded that the assets be made public in the best inter­est of transparency and ac­countability.

Meanwhile, the Chief Jus­tice of Nigeria (CJN), Justice Mahmud Mohammed, in his speech at the event, urged the Bar to purge itself of its dishonest members for the Bench to be corruption-free.