EFCC chairman Abdurasheed Bawa has called on media practitioners to their various platforms to call out corrupt individuals in the society.

Speaking at the opening of a workshop on economic and financial crime reporting organised by the commission for journalists, Mr Bawa appealed to journalists to expose such individuals.

“I urge you to expose them on the pages of your newspapers, screens of television or on your various online platforms,” he said.

The anti-graft agency boss maintained that the fight against corrupt practices should not be left to the commission alone for the sake of the country’s future.

“Without doubt, the media’s ability to inform and sensitise the people on the ills of corruption and economic crime is crucial for us,” he stated.

He said the media had given the EFCC visibility and made it a reference point in effective law enforcement in Nigeria.

Mr Bawa said the workshop was one of the interventions by the commission to improve the capacity of the media to deliver on its constitutional mandate.

“Nevertheless, there are issues in the media profiling of the commission that are less than desirable.

“The notion, for instance, that the commission is draconian in its approach to fighting cybercrime is perhaps borne out of the poor understanding of its modus operandi.

“But I am convinced that at the end of this workshop, we will all be better educated on the processes and procedures of the EFCC,” he said.

He said the commission had recorded 2, 210 convictions between January and August 2022, as against the 2,220 recorded in 2021.

“One achievement you may not easily recognise is the impact the EFCC’s intervention made in the forex market on the value of the Naira.

“The commission’s intervention led to a significant appreciation of the naira from well over N710 to the Dollar in the parallel market, and we are not relenting in our efforts to check harmful speculative activities in the sector.

“I urge you to also beam your searchlights on this area as it is in our collective interest to have a national currency whose value is not subject to the whims of crooked speculators,” Mr Bawa said. 

(NAN)