By Ikugbadi Oluwasegun
Mr. Ola Olukoyede, Executive Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has hinted of plans to rehabilitate convicted internet fraudsters with lesser sentences as a potent way of reorienting their minds and redirecting their productive energies to positive endeavours.
He stated this in Abuja on Thursday, when a delegation of the National Association of University Students (NAUS), led by President Obadi Marshal, paid him a courtesy visit at the corporate headquarters of the Commission.
“We have a plan to rehabilitate convicted internet fraudsters with lesser sentences. The plan is to work with the Correctional Centre to make them useful and more productive in the society.
He cautioned youths against indulging in internet crimes stressing that the implication of such an act is grave. “When you think deeply, that tag ‘ex-convict’ is not a good thing. You can never tell where you would find yourself tomorrow and they would want to profile you and discover that you are an ex-convict. So it is even in the interest of the youth that the EFCC is doing what it is doing to prevent them from indulging in the heinous act of cybercrime,” he said.
The EFCC’s boss also cautioned students against forming parallel organisations to pursue similar interests. “The issue of dichotomies of associations is disturbing. Regulate yourselves and the society will take you more seriously”, he said. He charged the students to always avoid hasty judgment of the operations of the EFCC, maintaining that the Commission is working in the overall interests of the nation.
Speaking earlier on the purpose of the visit, Marshal disclosed that it was to build synergy with the EFCC in its fight against
cybercrimes across Nigerian university campuses. “The aim of our visit today is to see how we can synergize and partner with the EFCC in eradicating cybercrime in all the higher institutions of learning in the country. The National Association of University Students, NAUS, has never been part of it and will never support it,that is why we are at the EFCC to see how we can collaborate to end it. The onus is on us all to save our youths from taking part in it and to save our country,” he said.
As a way forward, the NAUS
president requested for EFCC’s participation during orientation
programmes for new students across Nigerian universities, stating that sensitization of the fresh undergraduates by the Commission at that early stage could go a long way in moving their minds away from cybercrime and other financial vices as they face their studies.
“We need the presence of the Commission in our campuses during orientation of new students”, he said. He also enjoined the Commission to create more interactive platforms for youths to relate with it.