President Bola Tinubu has appointed Mr. Ola Olukoyede as Executive Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for a renewable term of four years.
The appointment is expected to be confirmed by the Senate in the coming days.
A terse statement by Ajuri Ngelale, Special Adviser to the President on Media & Publicity on Thursday, noted that the appointment falls in line with powers vested in President Tinubu as established in section 2 (3) of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (Establishment) Act, 2004, that “the Chairman and members of the Commission, other than ex-officio members, shall be appointed by the President,”
It noted that Mr. Olukoyede is a lawyer with over twenty-two (22) years experience as a regulatory compliance consultant and specialist in fraud management and corporate intelligence.
Ajuri also noted that he has extensive experience in the operations of the EFCC, having previously served as Chief of Staff to the Executive Chairman (2016-2018) and Secretary to the Commission (2018-2023). As such, he fulfills the statutory requirement for appointment as Chairman of the EFCC.
He said the new EFCC Chairman’s appointment follows the resignation of the suspended Executive Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mr. Abdulrasheed Bawa.
Meanwhile President Tinubu also approved the appointment of Mr. Muhammad Hassan Hammajoda to serve as the Secretary of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for a renewable term of five years in the first instance, pending Senate confirmation.
Mr Hammajoda is a public administrator with extensive experience in public finance management who holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Accounting from the University of Maiduguri and a Masters in Business Administration from the same university. He began his career as a lecturer at the Federal Polytechnic, Mubi. From there, he went into banking, including successful stints at the defunct Allied Bank and Standard Trust Bank.
“The President tasks the new leadership of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to justify the confidence given to them in this important national assignment as a newly invigorated war on corruption undertaken through a reformed institutional architecture in the anti-corruption sector remains a central pillar of the President’s Renewed Hope agenda,” the Presidential Spokesman noted in a statement.
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