Corruption in Nigeria: A Challenge to (original) (raw)
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The Legislature and Anti-corruption Crusade under Nigeria’s Fourth Republic, 1999-2013
Mediterranean journal of social sciences, 2014
An attempt by the Federal Government of Nigeria to remove subsidy on Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) popularly known as fuel opened a Pandora's Box which stories are still developing till today. On the insistence and prompting of Nigerians that corruption and fuel had been subsidized all along, the House of Representatives set up an Ad Hoc committee to look into alleged irregularities in the fuel subsidy regime. The committee after its investigation discovered that N1.4 trillion had been unlawfully paid out to the treasury looters. This particular fraud is said to be the most monumental in Nigeria and in Africa considering that it is close to half the annual budget of Nigeria and that of about seven West African countries put together. Few months after the submission of the report of the Panel which included recommendations for appropriate sanctions to culprits, Nigerians were yet treated to another drama when Mr. Femi Otedola whose company Zenon Oil had been fingered as one of the beneficiaries of the loot, came out to say that the chairman of the Ad Hoc Committee Hon. Farouk Lawan had solicited for 3moutofwhich3m out of which 3moutofwhich620,000 had been paid out to enable Hon Farouk Lawan remove Zenon Oil from any complicity in the scam. To say that corruption, like cankerworm, has totally devoured the very fabric of the Nigerian polity is merely stating the obvious. That the cost of public and private sector corruption to the nation, over the years, is unquantifiable is rather stale news. Likewise the fact that the agencies saddled with the responsibilities of checkmating corruption and prosecuting corrupt individuals has not done enough. Even the judiciary has not helped matters. And the question remains: Is there a way out of the woods? This is where the role of the legislature in the anti-corruption initiative is critical given the centrality of the role of the legislature in the political process of a polity. This paper examines how the legislature has faired in performing its constitutional and oversight duties in this regard. It finds a wide gulf of difference between constitutional prescriptions and political realities in a country where the legislature itself is confronted by daunting corruption challenges.
Journal of Developing Societies, 2016
Most theoretical and analytical discourse on national development identified the virulent nature of corruption as development curse. In Nigeria, as in many other soft states, the epidemic nature of corruption and its destructive impacts on the national development has received wider attention in both national and international mass media. Similarly, scholarly literature on the culture of sleaze in many of these countries revealed the depth of the disease. Nigeria, undoubtedly remain at the front page of countries under the siege of sleaze. Its profile as one of the most corrupt nations feeds largely into the crisis of its national development. Conceptually and theoretically, corruption encompassed very distinct social problems of mismanagement of public resources, weak and dysfunctional government institutions, complex relationships between political actors and public moral and economic assets. Indeed, the curse of corruption has assumed more than tantalizingly simple act of sleaze but a clear, complex and contested reality of national underdevelopment. It explains to a large extent the abuse of public power and misuse of entrusted power for private gain in the context of attaining national development. In this paper therefore, a continuation of the literature on corruption that espouses the interplay between the culture of greedy sleaze and national development is given bolder attention. The paper analyses a broad understandings of corruption from the analytical usefulness of an effective national development imperative. It further explains the interventionist roles of the ambitious anti-graft agencies and their contemporary challenges.
Corruption as a Bane of National Development in Nigeria
AJMS, 2020
The paper assessed corruption as a bane of national development in Nigeria. Over the years, corruption has been one of the major challenges affecting the development of Nigeria since the attainment of independence in 1960. This devastating situation appears non-stop in spite of several attempts to reverse the negative trends especially in the 21 st century. Secondary source was used. The study adopted content analysis as its methodological orientation. It reveals that, in most cases, transparency and accountability are not reflected in the implementation of most of our policies and programmes which undermines the quest for national development. These lead to the continued infrastructural deficit and the struggle towards realizing socioeconomic development and overall national integration. The paper recommends the need to strengthen the independence of anti-corruption agencies in carrying out their responsibilities without interference, in order for transparency and accountability to prevail. Governments should always engage civil societies and protect citizens, activists, whistle-blowers, and journalists in monitoring and exposing corruption. Finally, it is only leadership that emerges through free and fair election and has the people at heart can be relevant to the development of 21 st century Nigeria, amidst the numerous challenges facing the country in the present democratic regime.
Anti-Corruption Agencies and Eradication of Corruption in Nigeria
International Journal of Innovative Research and Development
Corruption has been acknowledged in the literature as a phenomenon that hinders development of a nation and as such, it is a practice that is common among the political settings. This does not mean, corruption cannot be found among individuals who do not hold public office, but the fact that, the public officers are entrusted with the public funds that are meant for the economic development and to be given proper account of such funds, makes it more pronounced among the politically exposed people. Frantically, corruption, either politically, intellectually, economically, morally or electorally etc. are not desirable, as it reduces resources meant for development, undermines growth and send wrong signals to the world, most especially to the foreign investors(Okechukwu, Igwe & Ezenwafor, 2017) In Nigeria, since the return of democratic government, there are lots of corruption cases pending which ought to have attended to, but unfortunately, not much has been done. There are cases that have gone deep in sleep, there are some not tried but granted bail, some are discharged and acquitted while there are some that are pardoned(Usman, 2014). Obviously, it is worrisome that with the levity hands in which the past administrations in this country have attended to these corrupt cases, its incidence has gone so deep into the garment of Nigerian economy to the extent that, when people in public offices steal or misappropriate public funds with evidence, they eventually escape justice. This is supported by the statement of Owosanoye (2014) which says, many of high corrupt profiles are hanging due to the unnecessary prolonged trials and frequently adjournments for flimsy excuses. He submitted that, once a case gets to hibernation, accused is empowered to clean up the crime trail, negotiate with or frustrate prosecution, peddle political influence to pressure prosecution and influence and frustrate the court. Nigerians have overwhelmingly suffered from the negative effect of corruption and continuous tolerance for corruption in the land has caused very high rate of poverty, insurgency, conflict, unemployment, underdevelopment, low standard of living in Nigeria (Ajodo-Adebanjoko &Okorie, 2014). Not only that, corruption has found its way into all public offices and has led in crippling the due process in government establishment, making it difficult to be eradicated. As said by Okechukwu et al, (2017), that eradicating corruption at both continental and national level has been very weak,
Theoritical of Corruption and the Nigerian state
THEORETICAL OVERVIEW OF CORRUPTION AND THE NIGERIAN STATE, 2022
This paper, Corruption and the Nigerian state presented corruption as a curse and a complex social, political and economic phenomenon that affect all facets and the fabric of Nigerian society. Scholars and Nigerian government do not offer any realistic practical recipes in dealing with the pressing problems of corruption, economic hardship and underdevelopment in Nigeria. Nigeria has experienced its fair share of such scandals, especially during the military era and even its current democratic dispensation. The impact of corruption on our national economy has manifested in different kinds of political, social, religion and economic vices. The enormity of corruption in Nigeria probably necessitated the establishment of anti-corruption agencies such as the Independent and Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC) and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), to nip the scourge in the bud. However, despite these institutional interventions, the fight against corruption in Nigeria seems nowhere close to being won. The method of approach is descriptive and phenomenological approaches based on the review of related literature. This paper presents the causes and consequences of corruption in Nigeria. Empirical evidence indicates that the absence of political will and the weakness of anti-corruption institutions to prosecute high profile culprits, the tardiness on the part of the country’s courts to promptly dispose of corruption cases and lack of accountable and transparent leadership, have undermined efforts to win the war against corruption. The paper recommends strict enforcement of anti-corruption laws, establishment of special courts for corruption cases and enthronement of good governance, as part of strategies to strengthen the anti-corruption crusade in Nigeria.
Anti - Corruption Crusade in a Post - Colonial State : Problems and Challenges
Nigerian Chapter of Arabian Journal of Business and Management Review, 2014
Endemic corruption has become an issue of major political and economic relevance in recent years. This has led to a resurgence of interest in analyzing the phenomenon and the diverse forms that it assumes in developing polities with an expectation that democratization and economic liberalization offer potential routes to dealing with the problem. As Nigeria moves towards her 51 st independence anniversary, the polity is at crossroads in its fight against graft. Aside from its internal battle to fight corruption, recent revelations on mega bribery scandals being perpetrated by the ruling elites have confirmed that corruption is a cancer that may stunt the nation's growth. In spite of the effort s of the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related Offences Commission (ICPC) stem the rising tide of corruption in the country. The socioeconomic menace has continued to maintain it's upwards trend, especially among public servants and political appointees. Critiques of the anti-corruption agencies blame the ugly trend on the mode of operation and of the agencies, which according them should be restructured. Some observers have also put the threshold on the criminal justice system and call for the creation of a separate court with the jurisdiction to try all allegations of corruption. The paper examines in a thematic form the various forms and types of corruption. The article also identifies various reasons that inhibit the graft war in Nigeria and the implications for governance. The paper concludes by positing that the recent political history of corruption in Nigeria suggests that corruption is not new, and that, indeed, corrupt practices have been part and parcel of Nigerian politics from inception.