The Federal Government last week rejected Nigeria’s rating as the fourth most corrupt country in West Africa as published in the 2019 Corruption Perception Index (CPI) issued by the Transparency International (TI). It ranked Nigeria 146 out of 180 countries and scored the country only 26 points out of 100, which seems to have upset government officials. An orchestrated campaign to discredit the report went on at home and abroad as officials berated the organisation and ridiculed its figures. Presidential spokesman, Garba Shehu, said Transparency International must have taken its figures from Nigeria’s opposition politicians.
Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, denounced the rating of Nigeria in the index and said the Federal Government’s effort to fight corruption was not being waged to impress any organisation.
TI on its part offered its parameters, noting that, for instance, lack of campaign finance transparency and increased perception of political power by the wealthy correlate with corruption. And campaign finance regulations are hardly ever raised in Nigeria much less enforced.
Two years ago, President Muhammadu Buhari, in a statement, had berated the organisation, faulting its methods and conclusions and likening its report to fiction. Although the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, later tried to soften the harsh tone of the presidency by likening the report to a wake-up call, it was clear the administration was disappointed by the report. This was understandable, though it was also an indication that the administration has been unduly optimistic about its attainments in that regard.
The 2017 Corruption Perception Index had scored Nigeria 27 per cent, which was just a point below its 28 per cent score for 2016. Yet, it pushed Nigeria’s ranking down 12 places from 136 to 148 out of 180 countries. It was the second worst score for the 18-nation West African sub-region, atop Guinea Bissau. Detailed analysis shows that Nigeria retained its positions on most indices. The one index on which the country fell short was the “Economic Intelligence Unit Country Risk Service.” Other indices, like the Transformation index, Policy and Institutional Assessment Index, Country Risk Ratings, Rule of Law, were stable.
It is undeniable that the government has taken certain visible measures to counter leakages through the Treasury Single Account (TSA), the Presidential Initiative on Continuous Auditing (PICA), and the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS), which have plugged payroll leakages said to amount to N5.7 billion monthly thus saving the country about N120 billion in purging 50,000 ghost workers from the wage bill. Enhanced remittances by government agencies are indications that progress has been made in revenue collection, with the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) leading the charge with the remittance of more than a trillion Naira for the first time in its history; the biggest surprise was the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), which astonished the nation by turning in N7.8 billion from its activities in 2017, and has not looked back ever since, a sharp contrast with its average remittance of N3 million in previous years. Good news was also reported in several other agencies. The new “whistle-blower” policy got 5,000 responses as at July 2017 and 365 of which were ‘actionable.’
We think the TI Report continues to sound a wake-up call. The government must realise that TI as an organisation gathers data about people’s perception, institutional assessment of the country, the international perception, especially, of the investor community to whom the issue of corruption is more than academic. The global business community and multilateral institutions are growing less and less tolerant of corruption. The grievous damage corruption has done to Nigeria and other African and Third World countries is such that the government must be seen to be on top of its game at all times. There must be no back-sliding or complacency.
But before Transparency International, there was the National Bureau of Statistics 2019 Corruption Survey Report, which reported late last year that 117 million bribes valued at N675 billion were given and taken in Nigeria. The average Nigerian has not felt any relief from the fight against corruption, apart from hearing the news reports of stupendous amounts occasionally announced as having been recovered. Corruption at our police check-points, police stations, and in our ports goes on with the police and the Customs officials showing no change of behaviour. Corruption in our licensing offices, in our traffic, in public service offices, goes on for the simplest permits and services, in our courts and prisons.
Even worse are the high profile cases like the “grass cutting” scandal that involved the ex-Secretary of the Government of the Federation, Babachir Lawal, the contentious Abdulrahman Maina recall, the recall to service of Prof. Abubakar Yusuf at the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) while being investigated, the unbelievable $43.4 million cash caught with the Director-General of the Nigeria Intelligence Agency (NIA). These issues were not resolved in a manner that assured Nigerians of the absolute integrity of high government officials or an assurance that due process has been followed. If Transparency International had factored some of these cases into its computations, an even lower score should have resulted.
