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Nigerian Govt And Its Shameful Practice Of Hiding The Identity Of Companies And Individuals It Fined For Violating Rules

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Nigeria Govt And Its Shameful Practice Of Hiding The Identity Of Companies And Individuals It Fined For Violating Rules (or Identity of People whose properties it forfeited –  (Dr Ope Banwo, the self-styled Mayor of Fadeyi is the Founder of Naija Lives Matter Organisation)

I sincerely believe It’s a glaring sign of unprofessionalism by both our newspapers and the government to announce that it has fined five airlines without naming them. This is reminiscent of when the EFCC announced the seizure of over 730 duplexes but refused to disclose the names of the individuals or entities the properties were registered to.

If you’re not going to tell us who was fined or who forfeited what, then why bother making the announcement?

It seems to me that even when the government pretends to fight corruption, they still find ways to shield their allies or influential patrons who might be implicated. The whole point of making such announcements is to expose the culprits, so others engaging in or contemplating similar actions can be discouraged.

When sanctions are imposed but the offenders remain unnamed, those individuals continue to parade themselves as pillars of society without any incentive to reflect, repent, or reform. In a country like ours, where public perception matters greatly—regardless of internal rot—this is just another example of paddy-paddy governance.

Yet, their apologists will argue that it’s standard practice worldwide to withhold such information. No!, it is not!

In countries like the USA or UK, when organizations or individuals are sanctioned, their names are made public. The information is often displayed prominently on official websites and in press releases and details are given for members of the public to follow. But here in Nigeria, we argue over such basic transparency, all in a bid to defend the government or protect the powerful. Why would anyone want to hide the names of people who have been found guilty of violating the law? 🤷🏿‍♂️

And then we wonder why corruption, inefficiency, and bad management persist in Nigeria. Bad actors just keep doing what they are doing knowing their institutional paddies will never name and shame them. So sad

Yet, Naming and shaming works wonders, especially in a clime like ours where every criminal still gets front seat in our churches and mosques since they have not been publicly disrobed so people can shy away from them in gathering of honest people .

Yet our government avoids this, for reasons best known to them. They’ll now tell us to go and “do research” to uncover the names. But why must citizens work so hard to obtain information if the government truly believes in transparency? Announcing actions without identifying the culprits renders the government no better than the offenders themselves—it makes them enablers of bad practices.

What’s even more appalling is the complicity of Nigeria’s premier newspapers in this unacceptable cover up by the govt institutions. For instance, Most Nigerian Newspapers reported the fines on airlines and the seizure of 735 properties without listing those affected. This shows either laziness or a lack of investigative rigor, or worse, complicity since most of our offline news outlets are owned by very few oligarchs, as they simply publish the incomplete information handed to them by the government without further scrutiny or investigation to educate the public .

In fact, even the EFCC that got a historic forfeiture of properties worth maybe over a Trillion Naira refused to name the individual or individuals that the properties are listed under, and is reportedly threatening sanctions against anyone who publishes the names of the criminals who stole public funds to build properties worth possibly trillions of naira.

We at Naija Lives Matter say Shior to everyone involved in this conspiracy of silence—government, media, and all enablers of bad actors in our nation. We can’t fight corruption and then inefficiency by covering up their shame in public . In a nation like ours where public image is everything to most of the established elites and power brokers, hiding their identities when caught red handed only encourages them to persist in their evil doing 🤷🏿‍♂️