The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has said that it secured a total of 3785 convictions across all its Commands in 2022.
The commission in a statement stated that the figure which emerged from a review of the Commission’s performance in the outgone year, shows a 70.5% improvement over its record for 2021(2220).
It said the numbers also represent a 98.93% success rate in prosecution given that the Commission lost only 41 cases, representing 1.07% within the period.
The Lagos Command recorded the most convictions at 765, closely followed by the Ibadan Command with 573 convictions and the Port Harcourt Zonal Command with 567. Meanwhile, the headquarters recorded 314 convictions.
The convictions secured by the EFCC in 2022 are the highest since its inception.
It was learnt that the upward trajectory was sustained by President Buhari’s anti-corruption and economic recovery stance.
In 2015, EFCC recorded only 103 convictions. By 2016, the number rose to 195 convictions. Note that this is the first full year of Buhari’s administration.
The figure improved further to 312 in 2018, and then 1280 in 2019. But then it dropped slightly to 976 convictions in 2020, possibly affected by the pandemic which slowed adjudications. In 2021, the total convictions increased to 2220.
In the seven years of the Buhari administration, the EFCC pointed out that the percentile improvement of EFCC convictions moved from 103 to 3785 to represent over 3574.8%.
While commenting on the performance, EFCC’s Executive Chairman Abdulrasheed Bawa commended the personnel for their dedication despite the challenges of criminal prosecution in court.
He, however, assured that the EFCC will continue to motivate all categories of staff for greater efficiency through capacity development and other incentives.
