The Vice President made this startling remark on Monday at a book presentation of the Ibadan-based elite group, House Of Lords, which just published an in-depth analysis by different experts titled; ‘Nigeria: The Challenges Of Growth And Development’.
The Vice President said that findings have led them to discover that Nigeria had lost this huge amount due to fraudulent spending for security equipment in the last administration.
“When you look at the sheer amount of money that have been embezzled, the sheer amount of money lost from any of these various cases of corruption, you will find that far too much has been lost.
“It was discovered a few days ago that the total amount of money lost just to corruption in part of…and provision of security equipment in the military is closer to 15 billion US dollars,” he said.
Osinbajo stated that President Buhari was on the warpath for perpetrators of such crass corruption and that heavy sanctions would be meted out on anybody who is caught. He warned that any culprit would be sanctioned to the full extent of the law, also noting that the nation just can’t keep up with such high-scale corruption.
He said “I believe strongly that it is important to send a message that no public officer can steal the resources of this country and expect to escape. I hope the message would be loud and clear and it will inform behaviour in the future.”
Professor Osinbajo also said of the elites in the nation “The limits of the growth and development of most nations largely depend on the strength of the value-driven influence of their elite, indeed it is evident that the reason for the development and growth of most societies is not resources, but values, otherwise African countries will be the most developed.”