War on corruption
Nigerians have watched with astonishment
as a number of public officers have been dismissed or arrested
or put on trial on charges of corruption. One of the most sensational
cases is that of Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, governor of oil-rich
Bayelsa State. Alamieyeseigha was arrested at London’s Heathrow Airport and is on trial
on charges of money laundering. Hundreds of thousands of pounds
sterling were allegedly found in his suitcases. The Economic and
Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), the Nigerian agency leading
what the Government calls a ‘war on corruption’, claims
credit for tipping off the British authorities.
Another state governor, arrested in Britain
months earlier on similar charges, jumped bail and returned to
Nigeria. He continues to govern his state, protected by constitutional
immunity. A senior minister, reportedly close to President Obasanjo,
died while facing trial for receiving bribes from a French firm
contracted to produce national identity cards. The inspector general
of police, accused of embezzling millions of dollars of allocations
to the police, has been dismissed and is now standing trial. A
former minister of education is on trial for literally handing
bags of cash to some senators (including the former president of
the senate) to protect his ministry’s
allocation in the national budget, and the senators are also being
prosecuted. Many state and federal officials and senior managers
in banks and other private companies are in detention, before the
courts or have fled abroad. So great is the fear of the EFCC that,
in some states, the big and shiny four-wheel drives of the politically
powerful have disappeared into thin air.
These are extraordinary developments in
a country where many people have accepted that corruption is a
normal way of doing business. Supporters of President Obasanjo
say that only a man of enormous courage and conviction could take
on this culture of corruption. But it seems many Nigerians are
unconvinced. The President has certainly taken on some powerful
individuals, yet he has very little popular support to show for
it.
| Nigerians are sceptical about claims that the President who
has caused so much suffering is genuinely interested in fighting
corruption |
Partly it has to do with the complexities
of Nigerian politics. The Bayelsa governor Alamieyeseigha may be
facing trial for money-laundering but he’s also been a powerful voice in demanding redress
for injustices that the Niger Delta region, from which most of
the country’s oil is produced, has suffered within the Nigerian
federation. The EFCC and the British police may consider him a
criminal, but there are some in the Niger Delta who think he is
a hero and a victim of the forces he’s fighting on behalf
of his people. When those who back Alamieyeseigha are challenged
about the money that was said to have been found on him, they retort:
is he the only corrupt governor?
That charge of selective justice, the allegation
that there’s
one kind of justice for Obasanjo’s supporters and another
for his opponents, is one more reason why his ‘war against
corruption’ does not seem to have resonated widely among
Nigerians. Rumours circulate that even those politicians apparently
close to Obasanjo who have been prosecuted have in fact fallen
out of favour before the EFCC became interested in them. The depth
of corruption over the years has bred so much distrust of political
figures that it’s easy to sell the notion that the current
Government’s efforts against corruption are really directed
at destroying its political opponents.
Obasanjo’s opponents also contest the President’s moral
authority to fight corruption. The 19 April 2003 election which
earned him a second term was so heavily rigged that wags call it
the 419 election, after the section of the Nigerian Criminal Code
that deals with fraud. In Rivers State, governed by one of Obasanjo’s
staunchest allies, the President received close to 100 per cent
of the votes on the electoral register. Challenged by opponents
and international observers, he promised to investigate this statistical
impossibility but never disclosed the results of his investigation.
For masses of Nigerians life has been very
hard under President Obasanjo. The most resented policy of the
Government has been the steady increase in the price of petrol,
to match price rises in the international market. Nigerians do
not accept that they should take the cost of rising global oil
prices when their country is one of the largest producers of oil
in the world. High fuel costs have resulted in increases in the
prices of basic necessities. The public sector and private companies
continue to lay off thousands of people every month. Nigerians
are sceptical about claims that the President who has caused so
much suffering is genuinely interested in fighting corruption.
They think that, as with his economic policies, the President’s
real motivation is to curry favour with international financial
institutions and Western governments. And the President has indeed
received far more praise for his war on corruption from institutions
such as the World Bank than from his own people.
Attacking the
culture of corruption in Nigeria is extremely important; the ‘privatization’ of
government by public servants has reached an unacceptable level.
But the message to President Obasanjo from his countrymen and women
is that his definition of corruption and indeed good governance
is too narrow.
If Obasanjo is genuinely interested in delivering
good governance, he must widen public participation in how the
country is governed, including in deciding how a real war against
corruption is to be waged. •
The novelist Ike Oguine lives in Lagos.
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