Seye Joseph
In Nigeria: if it is not any other thing, it must be corruption. A major bane that is crumbling the economic activities of the country, making the corrupt elites acquires illegitimate wealth at the expense of the innocent citizens. The issue of corruption in Nigeria has gained global attention. It is no longer news that corruption has assumed a pandemic proportion in Nigeria.
According to the PricewaterHouseCoper’s Report, corruption in Nigeria cost up to 37% of Gross Domestic Product which is nearly $2,000 per person that lives in Nigeria by 2030.
As part of effort to get Nigerian citizens involve in the fight against the act of corruption, BudgIT, a civic organisation that works to raise the standards of transparency and accountability in government and ensure the judicious utilisation of public funds organised a one day forum tagged ‘Cost of Corruption’, the forum that was organised with Access Nigeria Project (AGJS) brought together stakeholders from all the developmental sectors to look through various channels which the impact of corruption can be measured.
Giving insight to what the project was all about, the Project Director for the forum, Abayomi Akinbo said that everyone in the country has an idea of what corruption means. “Politicians stealing money meant for public use, students cheating in examination halls, civil servants demanding cuts before approving contracts and a long lists of other acts”
He mentioned that there are some forms of corruption people are not actually looking at, “we all look at corruption, which everybody believes that is always the political officials that are corrupt, but they were not looking inward, how our values and morals are decaying and how we the citizens are contributing to this corrupt system”
Akinbo who has been working on public finance and tracking of capital project said that there is a pattern that follows when there is a corrupt system, “when a public official takes 50 million out of public purse, this 50 million is supposed to be for a road in a particular area, and because of that fund that the government official has taken, the road is not fixed, then people die, when people die, lets says a breadwinner of a particular family die, and they have three kids, it affects the family, the kids loses hope, maybe a guy loses hope like how can he survive without his father and he goes into fraud; and in the process he gets caught”, he cited.
He opined that citizens have to understand that corruption cannot be totally eradicated because it is something that has to start with greed, and the human mind is fill with greedy, an average Nigerians is always looking forward to what to take and not what to add.
Speaking at the event, Executive Director of The Africa Network for Environment and Economic Justice (ANEEJ), David Ugolor called on government to look into laws that have been put in place to criminalize corruption like law enforcement institutions and others.
Ugolor gave example of numbers of international treaties the country has signed to fight intensified the fight against corruption that include United Nations Convention against Corruption and reviews that will strengthen Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, and Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission.
“The functionality of those institutions will help send a strong message and that will really concretize the political will within the percipiency”
“For instance, we talk about the non-confirmation of the EFCC boss, Ibrahim Magu who is the current acting chairman of EFCC, you are asking him to go and be investigating the National Assembly, in space of such challenge you can only expect that you will be face with challenge because there is question of I have not secure my confirmation, the people that are actually corrupt, are the ones that will confirm him”
“So this is a big problem, and Nigerians want corruption to be solved, so I think that Nigerians should arise to the challenge to sure that Magu is confirm”
Ugolor said that if the country has right leadership, things will change. “If you have a correct teacher in a classroom; what happen, there will be no cheating even when there is an attempt to cheat, once you are cut, you are brought to justice and this will send signal to other pupils in the class”
“But if you have a teacher who compromise, who is asking students to bring money, then the value system will remain there, if you want to change the value system, remove the teacher from the class and put in a right teacher that has the knowledge, and value system to drive the critical revolution in the classroom”, he urged.
Share this
