EFCC recovers $500m stolen assets in 3 years, offers  5% reward to whistleblowers — Olukoyede  

The Executive Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Ola Olukoyede, has offered whistleblowers across the world up to five per cent reward for actionable information leading to the recovery of monetary and non-monetary assets allegedly stolen from Nigeria and stashed abroad.

Mr Olukoyede made the offer on Wednesday, August 26, 2026, while delivering a lecture at the 43rd International Symposium on Economic Crime in Cambridge, United Kingdom.

The EFCC chairman urged individuals with credible information on the location of suspected proceeds of corruption linked to Nigeria to come forward, assuring them that the commission had an incentive scheme for information that resulted in successful asset recovery.

“I welcome all of you to the world of whistleblowing. If any one of you is privy to where Nigerian assets are stolen or taken to anywhere in the world, we have an incentive for you; between 2.5 per cent and 5 per cent, it’s going to go back to you upon recovery,” he said.

Mr Olukoyede said the incentive was designed to encourage people with useful information to assist the Nigerian government in tracing and recovering assets believed to have been acquired through corruption.

“You never tell if you give any information here, some of you may leave this place, multi-millionaire in your lifetime,” he told the audience, drawing applause.

The EFCC chairman also disclosed that the commission had recovered and secured the forfeiture of cash and assets worth more than $500 million to the Nigerian government within less than three years of his assumption of office.

“Within three years of my assumption of office, we’ve been able to forfeit both cash and assets worth over half a billion dollars to the government,” he said.

According to him, the recoveries were made possible by the professionalism and resourcefulness of EFCC investigators, judicial support and access to credible intelligence.

Mr Olukoyede also highlighted Nigeria’s non-conviction-based asset forfeiture framework, saying it empowered the EFCC to seek the forfeiture of assets reasonably suspected to be proceeds of crime without necessarily waiting for a criminal conviction.

He said the framework was similar to mechanisms available in jurisdictions such as Australia and Canada.

“We have something similar to what is obtainable in Australia and Canada that empowers us to apply the forfeiture to proceeds of what is suspected to be proceeds of crime,” he said.

According to him, the application of the framework had enabled the commission to secure the forfeiture of various assets, including an aircraft, a university, estates and houses allegedly linked to proceeds of crime.

Mr Olukoyede cited the recovery of 752 housing units linked to former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Godwin Emefiele, as one of the major cases handled by the commission.

He also spoke about an investigation involving former Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, SAN, saying the commission had secured the forfeiture of 48 properties out of 57 properties allegedly traced to him.

“Sometimes last year, I opened investigations upon reasonable suspicion of criminal abuse of office by the immediate past Attorney-General of Nigeria.

“We discovered that within eight years of his being in office, we were able to trace about 57 such properties to him. We’ve been able to forfeit about 48,” Olukoyede said.

The EFCC chairman said the commission’s asset recovery efforts demonstrated the importance of intelligence gathering, investigative capacity and effective judicial processes in tackling economic and financial crimes.

He called for greater international cooperation in tracing and recovering assets moved across jurisdictions, stressing that corrupt proceeds could only be effectively recovered when investigators and institutions were able to follow the money beyond national borders.

The Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crime is an annual gathering of anti-corruption, law enforcement, financial crime and economic crime experts from different parts of the world.

Mr Olukoyede’s presentation took place on the third day of the week-long 43rd edition of the symposium in Cambridge, United Kingdom.