The levity with which President Goodluck Jonathan derisively dismissed the latest US State Department report on corruption and human rights which rated Nigeria poorly, is indeed, not the most appropriate way to tackle an endemic problem. If the perception outlook of corruption in Nigeria is to improve, the President should be more accommodating of such critical independent reports. Denying their veracity or looking for loopholes to erode their credibility is playing the ostrich.
The US State Department Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2012, released at the weekend, said Nigerian government officials and agencies frequently engaged in corrupt practices with impunity. But rather than treat the report as a challenge to design and implement a systematic approach to fight corruption, the President seemed to have opted to bury his head in the sand by suggesting that Nigeria’s corruption indices were largely exaggerated.
Speaking on the report during the Presidential Power Reform Transactions signing ceremony at Aso Villa on Monday, Jonathan admitted that though corruption existed in the country, it was not of the magnitude as reported on the global front. He said: “Let me continue to assure Nigerians that yes, there are issues of corruption in this country, but somehow, they have been over amplified. People should watch how we have been conducting government business. We have been bringing down the issues of corruption gradually. If you look at the fertilizer sector, you will agree with me that if government actors were interested, we would have continued the same story of buying all kinds of things, awarding all kinds of contracts in the name of fertilizer. But we are not doing that. We have sanitized that sector.”
Even as a public relations gimmick, the President’s reference to the fertilizer sector as the frontline in the fight against corruption is a damning self-appraisal and a genuine admission of cluelessness, which has become a nauseating but defining hallmark of this administration. What is required is for the President to seriously address the threat posed by corruption to Nigeria’s future. The country is still reeling from the trauma of the oil-subsidy scam of mind-boggling proportion, which hit the public domain in the wake of public protests against the controversial subsidy removal policy. Those indicted for corrupt practices walk the streets without any qualm of conscience. Indeed, some were honored in the last national award exercise by the President.
The pension fraud case is still very fresh; where a man convicted of stealing N23.3 billion was sentenced to a fine of N750,000. The bizarre judgment provoked righteous public indignation and pointed to the degree of travesty to which the judiciary has been transformed to a haven of sorts for looters. While Nigerians feel a sense of outrage at the way elected public officials plunder the nation’s resources and flaunt this in the people’s face, corrupt public officials no longer worry about their arraignment in court anymore. Indeed, it is a big respite and a faster escape route with their loot.
The latitude of corruption and the corresponding official cover-up is so much that it takes the initiatives of foreign courts to put the corruption seal on well-known Nigerian criminals, like former Delta State Governor, James Ibori. But for the English court, Ibori almost became invincible as he got away with every allegation made against him and was freed by the courts in Nigeria. Ironically, the offences for which Ibori was acquitted by Nigerian courts were the same offences that earned him his conviction and imprisonment in Britain.
There is little doubt that time is running out on the country, as its diverse and growing security challenges are partly rooted in widespread poverty and unemployment, which in turn, are outcomes of pervasive corruption. Nigeria seems to have become a theatre of woes, impunity and heart-rending social injustice. The promises of democracy remain ephemeral as leaders and other state actors have daily multiplied the misery of Nigerians by their actions. The report demonstrates the dismal failure of the effort to reduce corruption and deploy Nigeria’s wealth to the socio-economic betterment of its citizens rather than into the pockets of politicians and bureaucrats. It is futile to dispute the report or to downplay its significance as the President did.
While most of the president’s “achievements” could be subject to debate, the claim about exaggerated corruption profiling by international organizations is misguided and patently false. President Jonathan is seeking to present a different reality from the current situation in Nigeria, but it is a well-known fact that corruption pervades every nerve and artery in the country and has been the bane of national development. Indeed, corruption thrives with impunity in low and high places. The corruption fighting agencies have been reduced to the notorious routine of police stations from which they were meant to be insulated by their independent existence.
Nigeria’s woeful performance on the composite index of corruption, human rights and good governance is a story of systemic corruption; a reflection of the sad inability of various national institutions to translate increasing allocations from resource endowments into better education, protection of lives and property, among others. Sadly too, opposition parties are equally involved in the politics of profiteering either at the national or state level; when they should be promoting a model of governance that pressurizes the ruling party to change and give Nigerians hope. It is saddening that corruption investigations by both the legislative and the executive arms have become avenues by committees to “shake down” officials in Ministerial Departments and Agencies (MDAs) rather than a genuine attempt to hold them accountable.
There is no coherent agenda for scaling back the enormous corruption in the MDAs or for making the anti-corruption agencies more effective. Gross violation of the right to life has been ascendant due to low intensity insurgencies in some parts of the country, a reality to which FDI is allergic. Unemployment in the country is above 50 per cent and is constantly on the increase. Despite poor performance of serving ministers, none has been sacked while Prof. Bath Nanji, one of the few technocrats driving the power sector was pressured out by vested interests, thereby hampering prospects of improved electricity supply in the country. Progress and credibility in the fight against corruption can be won only through concrete, well-thought-out plans and not denial and cheap sloganeering.
Corruption in politics and public service is a reflection of the greedy nature of Nigerian politics and governance that is already asphyxiating the country. Downplaying the severity of the problem obviously increases the appeal of unorthodox means to change the status quo because Nigerians are not fooled by official pretences to fight corruption. There should be a hydra-headed response to corruption; and the buck stops at the desk of the President, who must take the lead in saving the country from corruption.
Huhuonline.com Editorial
