Officials from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Department of Justice of the United States of America (USA) have offered to provide relevant support to the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) to help it improve its operations.
This offer was made when a team of US government officials visited the Commission recently. The team included: Special Agent Pamela Bergren of the FBI; Scott Thorley of the US Department of Justice; Special Agent John Wilson of the FBI and Legal Attache, US Embassy, Nigeria; and Jim Oscar of the FBI.
Speaking during the visit, Mr. Wilson said the team would like to organize a mentorship programme for investigators and prosecutors of the Commission. He emphasized that the involvement of prosecutors in the investigation process of a case from start to finish would greatly improve the chances of successful prosecution.
The Special Agent, while noting that the team had been working with other anti-corruption agencies in Nigeria, also added that the mentorship would help the officers of the Commission to achieve timely case management and save resources that would have been otherwise wasted.
In his remark, the Chairman of ICPC, Mr. Ekpo Nta, represented by the Secretary to the Commission, Mr. Elvis Oglafa, told the delegation that the Commission was interested in any form of assistance that the US could render to ICPC.
He however requested the visitors to be more definitive about the nature of the mentoring assistance they were proposing while adding that the Commission would welcome any ideas that would lead to improvements in its prosecutorial and investigative processes as well as the various preventive strategies being adopted by the Commission in its anti-corruption campaign.