President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has called on the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to classify resource theft, particularly illegal mining and mineral smuggling, as international crimes, warning that the menace poses a serious threat to peace, stability, and economic growth across the subregion.
The President made the appeal on Tuesday while declaring open the 7th Annual General Assembly of the Network of National Anti-Corruption Institutions in West Africa (NACIWA), held at the ECOWAS Secretariat in Asokoro, Abuja.
The conference, themed “A United ECOWAS Against Corruption: Strengthening Regional Collaboration for Asset Recovery and Exchange of Information,” brought together heads of anti-corruption agencies, ECOWAS officials, development partners, and civil society representatives.
Represented by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Senator George Akume, President Tinubu lamented that decades of reforms had failed to curb illicit financial flows and resource theft, which continue to erode regional development.
“Even now, illicit outflows remain an odious miasma. Stealing of mineral resources is on the rise in the region, fueling the proliferation of small arms and light weapons and other violent crimes such as kidnapping and banditry. These have exacerbated our security challenges and worsened the development outlook of the region”, he said.
The President emphasized that the time had come for ECOWAS to take decisive collective action.
“The time has come for ECOWAS to designate resource theft, illegal mining and stealing of minerals as an international crime that threatens the stability of the region, and galvanize the world against trade in stolen minerals from West Africa,” he stated.
Tinubu further underscored the need for stronger regional cooperation in tackling corruption, financial crimes, and illicit flows.
He said, “No country can single-handedly win the battle against illicit flows. It requires collaboration, and NACIWA offers ECOWAS a multi-state and multi-stakeholder platform to harness regional efforts against corruption and its manifestations.”
Highlighting Nigeria’s recent progress in the anti-corruption drive, the President noted that his administration had prioritized asset tracing and recovery, supported by a new legal framework for asset management.
“The vision has translated into the recovery of humongous sums by the anti-corruption agencies. One of the agencies, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), under the leadership of Ola Olukoyede, who incidentally is the current President of NACIWA, has been prolific in recovering stolen assets,” he said.
Tinubu added that recovered assets are being deployed for productive purposes.
“Our commitment is to ensure that recovered stolen assets become enablers of growth and instruments for social inclusion. Two legacy programmes of my administration — the Students Loan Scheme and the Consumer Credit Scheme — commenced operation with the injection of ₦100 billion in recovered proceeds of crime by the EFCC,” he disclosed.
In his welcome address, the EFCC Chairman and President of NACIWA, Ola Olukoyede, thanked delegates for their commitment to regional cooperation and reaffirmed NACIWA’s position as a unifying force in West Africa’s anti-corruption efforts.
Olukoyede highlighted the network’s achievements since 2022, noting that despite numerous challenges, the current executive committee has repositioned NACIWA into a “more dynamic and credible platform for regional collaboration.”
The event reaffirmed ECOWAS’ collective commitment to strengthening anti-corruption frameworks and enhancing cross-border partnerships for asset recovery and accountability in West Africa.
