BY VICTORIA OJEME

ABUJA—International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Officer, United States Embassy, Ms Diane Kohn, yesterday, expressed displeasure over the manner the Nigerian government handled the Halliburton bribe scandal.

She told newsmen, yesterday, in Abuja, that the US punished the company involved in the Halliburton scandal, wondering why those that received the money in Nigeria had not been punished.

Kohn said Nigeria was not doing enough in the fight against corruption.

She said corruption was a global problem that is not peculiar to Nigeria, adding that even in the US, there was corruption but that culprits were usually punished when found guilty.

Kohn noted that corruption sucks money out of the economy, which affects the building of roads, power and other social amenities.

She gave several instances of corrupt officials not prosecuted and advised the Federal Government to be more willing in its efforts at prosecuting officers found guilty of corruption.

Kohn said: “There are cases like we see public officials with houses in London, in the United States and there are a few of them that the Department of Justice is looking at.

“If you look at the number of high profile cases that have come to conviction where assets have been recovered, there are not very many of them.

“They have agreed what the standards should be for transparency, for criminal codes, for criminal enforcement and for international cooperation.

“What we are saying to Nigeria is that we are going to help you trace the money but you have to go after the corrupt officials. One thing that we have found, and is very apparent in Nigeria, is that corruption affects not only your economy, it directly sucks money out of your economy.

“We are hoping that as time goes on, we can work more closely with Nigeria to help confront this, but that means Nigeria has to be willing to go after the corrupt officials.”

She called for proper funding of security agencies, even as she said that the security community was suffering from inadequate budget.

“The police should be fully funded to protect Nigerian citizens. We see that the police is not fully funded. Their training facilities are in very poor shape. The police are not being trained to do everything. They are supposed to keep Nigerians safe,” Kohn added.