The Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB), has said it has asset declaration forms of President Muhammadu Buhari and Vice Presidents, Yemi Osinbajo in its custody.
The Herald gathered CCB stated that it has some other polictical leaders’ asset forms also but it cannot disclose them because they are not meant for public consumption.
The bureau said the existing law guiding its operations did not allow for such disclosure and except the National Assembly amends the law, it had no power to make such information public.
The CCB said these in a counter-affidavit it filed in opposition to a suit seeking the disclosure of the content of the asset declaration forms submitted by Buhari and Osinbajo.
Adebayo said: “The asset declaration forms of the President and ministers of the Federal Republic of Nigeria requested by the application contain personal information about them and their properties, assets and liabilities and those of their wives/husbands and children under the age of 18 years.
“The applicant has neither shown that it is in the public interest to disclose the information nor that such public interest outweighs the protection of the privacy of the Presidents, Vice Presidents, Senate Presidents, Speakers of the House of Representatives, state governors and deputy governors since the return to democracy in 1999.”
The suit marked FHC/L/CS/2019 and pending before the Federal High Court in Lagos was filed by an anti-corruption advocacy group, Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project.
A Senior Admin Officer with the CCB, Ellis Adebayo, who deposed to the counter-affidavit to SERAP’s suit, said she was informed by the bureau’s lawyer, Musa Ibrahim, that the law did not permit the CCB supply SERAP with the information in the Buhari and Osinbajo’s asset declaration forms.
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