Anambra State Housing Commissioner , Hon. Pauly Onyeka has emphasized the importance of accountability and transparency by public office holders as a measure that will exalt them before the public in future.
The Commissioner stated this while receiving officers from the Bureau of Code of Conducts, Anambra State Office, at Jerome Udorji Secretariat Office Complex, Awka, during their advocacy visit to the ministry.
The Commissioner stated: “I must tell you, Nigeria is a nation that sometimes, when l look at the behaviour of people, l begin to wonder whether we are progressing or in retrogression because this exercise, for me, is a civic responsibility for any official or government personell”.
He said that asset declaration will also help the public office holder to stem the issue of corruption because from time to time, you will give account – when you are entering the office and when you are leaving.
“As you do your asset declaration appropriately, by the time you are leaving, the difference will now be used as a check to estimate what you have gotten between the period you have worked and you will be exalted. However, if you did not declare, it will not be known as it will help to keep your record clean,” he said.
He suggested that the bureau should strategize their advocacy visits to reduce tension as some people run away from coming for declaration with the hope that they will be persecuted.
Earlier in his speech, the State Director, Code of Conduct Bureau, Mr Micheal Okwose said that the sensitization visit was to address the issue of corruption in the public sector through administering the asset declaration form.
He also said that they distribute the provision of the Code of Conducts Forms through asset declaration to the public officers so that their behaviors and actions in Federal, State or the Local Government should conform with the public modality and accountability .
Mr Okwose noted that the asset declaration exercise is not a witch-hunting instrument and that they are not trying to make people poor rather, they encourage public servants to do business, provided it is not encroaching into government’s time.
“We implement government policies and programmes. It is our programme that will impact positively in the lives of people outside our ministry, outside our organisation and we are expected to implement these policies and programmes. We must be honest, transparent and accountable”.
He later took time to explain the items in the documents and how they are filled and warned against false data, which he said the bureau would not take lightly.