In Nigeria, law enforcement agencies like the Police, and more recently the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC do nothing to prevent crime, they only respond to crime. Fighting corruption takes two forms: preventive measures that deter the evil act and make it very difficult and unfriendly to even contemplate and then curative measures, which come by way of response to alleged cases of corruption. Allegations, as we all know, are very difficult to prove in courts. Thus, the anticorruption program of the federal government achieves little because it tends to place greater emphasis on response; the structures necessary to deter and prevent the vice are either flawed or absolutely absent, leaving the EFCC and the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission, ICPC to always suffer and spend a lot of time and resources to investigate what is otherwise very “transparent” thievery with little success. And often, the transparent thieves escape tongue in cheek with their loot all because a very clear case cannot be legally proven.

There are other important preventative measures and processes that equally deserve attention and strengthening, perhaps even more than the police and the EFCC are getting in the fight against corruption in Nigeria.

Strong Ethics System

I had privilege to do NYSC in the Senate Ethics Committee of the National Assembly, Abuja between 2001 and 2002. I joined just after the committee had drafted a code of ethics for senators with the collaboration of an international NGO. The draft became the butt of jokes each time the Ethics and Privileges Committee Chair brought it up on the floor. “How can we disclose my assets and business dealings to the public”? For our politicians, this is unheard of. But a sound, transparent code of ethic must contain clauses that demand public declaration of assets by “public servants”. The word public really means public, not private. Once you get into a public position to serve, a huge part of your personality as a servant ceases to be private. It becomes a property of the public!

The South African senate for instance, has a code of conduct that requires senators to initially file all assets and promptly report acquisition of new assets within a specified time period. This applies to all top public officials, elected and appointed. “MPs are expected to register in Parliament their financial interests and those of their spouses, dependants and permanent companions every year. Most of this information is open to the public. The confidential part of the register includes details about the monetary value of MPs' interests and all details about spouses, dependent children and permanent companions of MPs”.[i] The public, civil society organizations can freely access this information. Most real democratic states throughout the world (e.g. Sweden, Denmark, United Kingdom, Portugal, Uganda, Botswana, Mali among others) require full public disclosure of assets and interests: it means this information is filed publicly and is accessible to all members of the public. Most anticorruption cases in these countries grow not out of “suspicion” by some government agency that “knows all”; they grow out of public scrutiny and complaints.

In Abuja, the constitution requires all public servants from a certain level to formally declare their assets and interests to the Code of Conduct Bureau, but it is not made public, unless on special request. In fact, the Bureau resorts to hide and seek when such requests are made. There is no point for public servants to “declare” their assets and interests if it would be hidden is some “confidential” file.

Between Gift and Bribe

A proper code of ethics clearly defines: what is a “gift”? When does a “gift” become a “bribe”? Who is giving the gift and who is receiving the gift? What is the relationship between the giver and the receiver? There most be clear limits to what constitutes a gift, these limits can be defined in terms of monetary value. When these codes are clearly defined and delineated, people would be careful to accept certain “gifts” from certain “givers”, because they would need to, and must be prepared to answer certain questions satisfactorily to avoid clearly specified punishment.  For instance, the Milwaukee City Ethics Code (that is a local government, to tell how even local governments have gone far in ensuring ethical behavior for its staff!) in the state of Wisconsin, USA, requires its staff and elected leaders to formally file direct or indirect gift or gifts, or honorarium that exceeds a cumulative value of $50 in any given year.[ii] Because of fears, the Chair of the Milwaukee City Ethics Board confessed to a group of visiting African activists: “I do not accept gifts of whatever value, even from my family including my children, and I will not for as long as I am in this position”.

This is no attempt to undermine or be insensitive to our culture as Nigerians. We can ensure clarity by defining the limits, in a society where cows fly around like chickens during festive periods, how do we define the limits? This might appear very Herculean, but we cannot overlook it. A situation where one governor spends tens of millions of Naira to distribute “gifts” of rams/turkeys and hampers to over 200 “beneficiaries” is permissible in the absence of clear definitions. With clear limits to what constitutes “gift”, it would be difficult for Julius Berger, the filthily corrupt German construction company, to “drop” pre-fabricated mansions in the villages of government engineers as “gifts”.

Freedom of Information (FOI) Vs Official Secrets Act

In Nigeria, civil servants are gagged by the official secrets act, which is rooted in a colonial ordinance that has never been changed one bit. Nothing, no letter or word has been added or subtracted from this colonial ordinance since independence 48 years ago. As part of their employment contract, civil servants are made to sign an agreement NEVER to disclose any “official information”. The official secrets act has indeed served the Nigeria ruling elite more than it did the colonial master. But then what are the secrets? Budget figures, the age of a Director in the federal civil service, expense reports on monthly office overhead costs or contract figures? All these items that are grouped as “official secrets” or “classified information” which must never be heard serve no purpose other than fuel and encourage corruption.

Some federal civil service directors remain in the service by changing their dates of birth through manipulation of “affidavit” or “declaration of age”. Some of them have served since graduation from universities since the early 1970s, yet they foolishly claim to be in their early 50s by age…it means that they graduated and had university degrees in their early teens! This transparent corruption could only thrive where mere age records are classified as “secret”! Or look at the open thievery of the monthly “imprest” given to departments in our ministries: money meant to buy copier papers, service office machines, fix dead electric bulbs and broken toilet systems is shrouded in secrecy. No one in the office knows when such moneys are disbursed, few people share it, if the department head is “generous”, this monthly “imprest” is retired through file loads of “receipts”, yet you would not find a pen or note pad to write with in these offices, you will see broken down chairs and toilets and “dark light” as one office assistant told me in one of the juicy Abuja ministries.

People are afraid of speaking all because everything is regarded as “official secret”. It is not sufficient to publish state and local government allocations, government departments and agencies and local governments must be compelled by law to do annual financial reports that list budget implementation line by line, what had been accomplished, what was on-going and what was cancelled or discontinued, with reasons and explanations. These must be made available to the public free of charge or on demand. When EFCC swooped on Ogun State officials last year, the Ogun State government in turn swooped on some of its staff for disclosing “official secrets”. There is nothing secret about the government business to warrant this gagging of our civil servants. It serves no purpose but to cover up glaring corruption.

And make no mistake about this: there is a huge cult of kleptocrats that prevents the freedom of information legislation from getting passed. The FOI legislation, if passed, would automatically render useless the official secrets ordinance. That is why Olusegun Obasanjo, the petty dictator brazenly refused to sign the FOI bill before being forced out in May 2007, in spite of the fact that no bill had enjoyed continuous aggressive civil society advocacy from 1999 to 2007.

Independence of Institutions

None of the institutions for fighting and preventing corruption in Nigeria is truly independent. The EFCC is not, neither is the ICPC. When the immediate past senate made an amendment to insulate the EFCC Director-General from whimsical presidential removal, Nuhu Ribadu berated the senators, preferring to remain under a petty dictator as his “boss”. The Nigerian Judiciary has become fearless and is gaining strength not because more “brave” Justices are appointed to the bench. It is because they have been insulated from arbitrary removal or punishment by the all powerful “executive” president or governors. The independence enjoyed by the Nigerian judiciary is what is required of other institutions like EFCC, ICPC, Code of Conduct Bureau, Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC and Auditor-General’s Office for instance.

Heads of such institutions may not be appointed for life like the judges, but they can be appointed for single six, seven or eight year terms that will outlive elected executive leaders; once appointed, the heads of such institutions may never be removed by the president or governor, they could only be removed by senate through a two-thirds majority vote. Real independence also means financial independence, once the annual budgets for these independent commissions has been approved and signed into law; no petty dictator should decide when to “release” funds already legislated. That is why the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation must be one of the truly independent bodies, and a new Accountant General for the Federal Government be separate from the former. These are measures that will help heads of these key institutions to move against criminals without fear of being removed.

Confiscate Illicit Wealth

A truly independent institution should be given the powers to go after “illicit wealth”. Whoever suddenly begins to live extravagantly must be ready to explain to the public that the source of that instant wealth is not criminal. If the source cannot be clearly explained and understood as coming from appropriate activity, that wealth should simply be confiscated by the state. It is like parents who see their kid buying and eating different brands of sweets and biscuits, when they know fully well they did not give their kid so much, or did not give him anything at all. The good parent would inquire from the kid the source of the sweets and biscuits, and confiscate it if the child cannot explain how s/he came about these so much candies and cookies! Clean money has got to be separated from dirty money, and criminals and government thieves must not be allowed to live in luxury with their stolen wealth. Anyone with a clean source of money should just prove it. This kind of law exists in countries like France, Scotland, Yemen and Mali. A law to empower a truly independent EFCC and/or ICPC to confiscate illicit wealth would be a good deterrent as well as cure for corruption in Nigeria.

Prevention will aid Response

Response means chasing after thieves and robbers that have long hidden their loot and “cleaned their mouths”. It is really difficult to prove that they have “eaten” any “soup”, even more difficult to tell whether it was egusi, ewedu or edikang-ikong soup. That is the dilemma confronting EFCC and ICPC, they spend all their time and resources chasing after so few very well-known public crooks and visible thieves, and have been able to establish cases against even fewer. The vast majority of “transparent” thieves are going about freely and enjoying their loot very conspicuously. Systematic preventive structures and processes can help to provide more evidence(s) for response organs like EFCC and ICPC to act on. It would therefore, be worthwhile for government to give more attention to preventive anticorruption measures.

Robot  Villager

# 1 In Nigeria, law enforcement agencies like the Police, and more recently the Economic and Financi...Read the full article. Posted by Robot| 27.02.2008 15:58

Bode_Boluz  Villager

# 2 Wow... This is a great Intelligence Briefing worthy of due notice. Puts a lot of things in perspective. Posted by Bode_Boluz| 27.02.2008 17:52