News Investigators/ The Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) has warned members of the public against refusing or evading response to invitations in relation to petitions against them.
Emmanuel Dio, acting Resident Anti-Corruption Commissioner in Anambra gave the warning in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Awka on Friday.
Mr Dio said some respondents often run to the cover of the court by filing for fundamental right and obtaining restraining orders just because they were invited by the agency to state their own part of the issue in question.
He said ICPC invitations were harmless and did not amount to arrest, which was why the agency advised those invited to come with their lawyers, relations or any other person of their choice.
He said even though no court grants such others, refusal to honour ICPC invitation was an offence with consequences that could outweigh that of the alleged offence proper.
“A worrisome trend that we have observed is that people who we invited to respond to the petitions either ignore or run to court to obtain a restraining order, even though the courts always reject these applications.
“Such people are only making the period of investigation longer because most of these cases are not time bound, they will always come back in the end but the danger for these people is that we may be compelled to invoke relevant sections of the law and enforce arrest.
“We encourage anybody who gets our invitation to honour it, they should come with their lawyers or any person of their choice, all ICPC cases are bailable offences,” he said.
Mr Dio said the ICPC was currently investigating three Federal and three state institutions in Anambra with the aim of determining whether research grants given to some members of their staff members by TETFund were being judiciously utilised.
He said as part of curbing corruption tendencies in the public sector, ICPC had set up Anti-Corruption units in about nine organisations including five of them being fully functional.
He urged members of the public to feel free to lodge complaints against corrupt practices and actions that amounted to abuse of office authority while assuring that the anonymity of complainants was guaranteed.
“We also have the National Youth Service Corps Community Development Service group that is also helping with the awareness campaign against corruption and abuse of authority,” he said.
NAN
