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The purpose of this paper is to appraise the Nigerian Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) of their role in tackling systemic corruptions and to associate how institutional and organizational factors influence the performance of the EFCC.

Data were gathered through in-depth interviews, non-participatory observations and documentary analysis.

The results of the integrative analysis show that the EFCC has apparently been ineffective, and further improvization of the organization is needed. Poor performance of the EFCC was associated with factors such as lack of commitment, inefficient judiciary, insufficient budgets and incompetent personnel.

This study recommends further improvements in the form of a greater political will, improved legal process and also elevated budgetary funds and recruitment of personnel to the EFCC.

The study adopted a descriptive, qualitative case study approach to describe the current state of the EFCC in Nigeria.

The purpose of this paper is to critically examine the Economic and Financial Crime Act 2004 to investigate whether there are defects in the 2004 Acts which enable abuse of the system by those who are responsible for fighting corruption and other economic crimes in Nigeria.

The paper adopts qualitative methods of research. The research studied the laws and regulations relevant to the recovery and management of proceeds of crime. However, personal experience of the author in the civil service, security and law enforcement accounts significantly.

The paper finds that the provisions of the EFCC Act 2004 relevant to the recovery of proceeds of crime and management of recovered assets are defective. The 2004 Act contains loopholes that enable mismanagement and diversion of recovered assets for personal use. Although the EFCC Act empowers the Minister of Justice to issue Regulations to regulate the activities of the EFCC, the Asset Tracing, Recovery and Management Regulations 2019 the Minister of Justice issued cannot be used to close the loopholes. Thus, there is an urgent need to amend the EFCC Act 2004.

Non-availability of data on the mismanagement of seized and recovered assets is a severe limitation. Thus, analysis in this research focuses on the laws and regulations to illustrates the defects in the 2004 Act. Also, the study could only use reported cases and incidence of corruption among the security and law enforcement to illustrate unsuitability of security and law enforcement for the position of the chairman of the EFCC.

There is no comprehensive work that examines the defects of the provisions of the 2004 Act that breeds lack of transparency in the recovery of proceeds of crime as well as mismanagement of recovered assets. Therefore, this paper is of value to the Nigerian Government and the National Assembly in considering amendments to the EFCC Act 2004. The paper is also of importance to researchers.

This paper aims to assess if the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has been effective in combating corruption in Nigeria from 2003-2012.

The paper adopted a documentary analytical approach.

The organization has not been effective in combating corruption in Nigeria.

The study is between 2003-2012.

There is a need to correct those identified inhibitors that undermined the Commission’s capacity, such as intrusive government interference, lack of autonomy, poor funding and weak laws, among others, to mitigate corruption.

Eliminating those identified constraints will remove the incentive to be corrupt, thereby curbing the desire to be corrupt.

This paper is an original assessment of the EFCC's effectiveness in combating corruption in Nigeria during the specified period.

This paper aims to assess the roles of agencies in combating illicit financial flows (IFFs) in Nigeria. Specifically, this paper explores the roles of the major anti-corruption agencies – the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and Independent Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) – in curbing IFFs in Nigeria. This paper reviews the various activities and achievements of these agencies in combating IFFs and concludes that in spite of the effort made by these anti-graft agencies, Nigeria still ranks top among African countries suffering from IFFs. Therefore, this study recommends a need for a collective and coordinated strategy by authorities worldwide to address the difficulties posed by financial crimes.

This study reviews the roles of anti-graft agencies in combating IFFs in Nigeria. Specifically, this study explores the roles of EFCC and ICPC in combating IFFs.

This study concludes that in spite of the effort made by Nigeria’s anti-graft agencies, IFFs have continued to increase thereby impeding the effort to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 16.4 – reduce IFFs.

This study contributes to the existing body of knowledge by exploring Nigeria's major anti-graft agencies and their effort in curbing IFFs in Nigeria.

To demonstrate how the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC) can sustain relevance in the bid to check corruption despite the encroaching regulatory intervention of the Economics and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in Nigeria.

An analytic approach; to make the case that the ICPC is still relevant in the regulatory scheme as a dedicated agency to corruption issues in Nigeria, the provisions of the Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Act, 2004 are reviewed and the structure of the ICPC is examined. The powers and functions of the ICPC are highlighted with the sole intent that the opportunities which exist for the ICPC to be relevant within the current regulatory scheme can be identified and analysed.

Whilst the risk of competitive regulation persists, there is a persuasive case for retaining the ICPC as a separate agency dedicated to the fight against corruption.

To challenge the ICPC to change the focus of its regulatory activity from prosecution to prevention through the adoption of forensic strategies that would strengthen private and public institutions and reduce opportunities for corruption.

This paper offers a measure of clarity on the regulatory scope of the EFCC and ICPC in the fight against corruption, economic and financial crimes.

In its fight against money laundering involving politically exposed persons (PEPs), the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has the dual mandate of maintaining equilibrium between two fundamental, but sharply contradictory objectives: establishing guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and responding to the policy imperative of nipping corruption in the bud through a pro-active involvement in preventative measures. This paper contends that as a result of the tension between these two divergent ends, the agency has found itself the spider in a cobweb of legalism designed by its adversaries to stymie its operations. Furthermore, and as a matter of priority, the paper calls for a major rethink of the appropriateness of criminal jurisdiction in the prosecution of financial crimes in Nigeria and elsewhere in Africa. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Case study and textual analysis of literature.

Civil jurisdiction of extracting the proceeds of the criminal activities of PEPs provides a better mode of deterrence than any criminal sanction could hope to achieve.

Creative in deciphering a major root cause of the ineffectiveness of criminal sanction as an anti-corruption weapon.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the seeming paradox that underpins Nigeria’s war on corruption. This paradox centres on the undue interference of the presidency in the war against corruption. This interference has resulted in selective prosecutions and a deceleration in the tempo of the anti-corruption crusade.

The study used an admixture of primary and secondary data to evaluate whether indeed Nigeria is fighting against corruption to win it. The primary data were derived from key informant interviews. A total of ten diverse experts were interviewed through the instrumentality of unstructured set of questions, which were administered to them with room for elaboration. The secondary data were sourced from archival materials.

The findings of the study centre on three key issues: a characteristic one-sidedness in the prosecution of alleged corruption offenders by the anti-graft agencies. Those with pending corruption cases who have decamped to the ruling All Progressives Congress have had their cases placed in abeyance. There is evidence of the politicisation of the war against corruption as well as evidence of weak institutionalisation, which robs the anti-corruption agencies of the capacity to act independently.

The anti-corruption war may likely be derailed if the operational efficiency of the anti-graft agencies is not enhanced and their independence guaranteed.

If the anti-corruption crusade fails, it will have multiple negative domino effects on national development and quality of life of the Nigerian people.

The paper is original because no recent study has interrogated the declining efficiency of Nigeria’s anti-graft agencies or linked this declining efficiency on weak institutionalisation and interference from the presidency.

The purpose of this paper therefore is to identify and examine major issue-areas in law, prominent among which are the Plea-Bargain and S308 Immunity Clause, and how they impact the process of effectively combating corruption in Nigeria.

The paper uses documentary sources and analytical method to examine the issues involved.

The identified issue-areas are inhibitors rather than facilitators.

The implication is that the government needs to change the existing laws to strengthen the fight against corruption.

This is to ensure that the war against corruption is strengthened and effective.

To ensure that offenders face the full weight of the law for their action.

This paper is the author's original work and all references are appropriately acknowledged.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the general direction and pattern of modern economic and financial crimes statutes in Nigeria.

This paper examines Nigerian economic and financial crime statues.

This paper identifies the trend and features, which are common to all the statutes irrespective of economic and financial crime covered by them.

This paper shows that although Nigerian economic and financial crimes statutes have evolved gradually from Military era Decrees, and target different aspects of economic and financial crimes, there are certain features, which are common to all of them.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the treats hindering war against illicit financial flows of organised crime in developing economies and Nigeria in particular. The examination shows that the impediments facing the fight against money laundering and organised crime financial flows vary from one country to another. It may be lesser in developed economies where most instruments, treaties and best practice recommendations to curb serious crime originated from. However, the impediments against the proceeds of organised crime in developing economies are overwhelming.

The research methodology adopted was qualitative analysis. This was applied through the use and analysis of documents and expert interviews.

The impediments jeopardising the success against organised crime and other related serious crime financial flows in developing economies are devastating. Consequently, the study offered some policy implications to help mitigate these impediments in developing countries. The dynamics and the phenomena of organised crime business model are operated with ingenious strategies within the global states. Therefore, staying in control of the menace and the threats originated from the organised criminal activities would require periodic review of the global initiatives, standards and strategies deployed by the standard setters to combat organised crime and its financial flows in developing and evolving economies. Additionally, the implementing countries should be carried along and allow to make inputs when such initiatives and standards are being developed.

In Nigeria, there is a clear evidence of “collateral damage” in terms of social justice as result of financial exclusion of many bankable adults of the country that do not possess unique identities for account opening documentation and customer due diligence of the Financial Action Task Force recommendation 10.

There have been quite a number of studies on organised crime and still fewer have recognised the need to explore the success or failure of combating the proceeds of crime in developing economies. This study provides answer to these gaps by screening associated risks of fighting the proceeds of organised crime in developing countries and Nigeria in particular.