It is too early to say that the battle against corruption in Nigeria is being won. It remains one of President Olusegun Obasanjo’s chief priorities. No-one knows exactly where the so-called advance fee or 419 scam first originated but it has become indelibly associated with Nigeria. If you have an e-mail address, the chances are that you have received a suspicious-sounding mail asking you for a small upfront fee and your bank account details in exchange for a share in a deceased dictator’s substantial estate. Believe it or not, many gullible (and greedy) victims have parted with thousands of dollars in the hope of instant riches, resulting in notoriety by association for Nigeria.
Tainted reputation
The advance fee scam hurts Nigeria’s international reputation, hardening the popular perception that the country is corrupt from root to tip. Little wonder, say commentators, that Nigeria is ranked 133 out of 134 countries by sleaze watchdog Transparency International.
“The indulgence by a few Nigerians in advance fee fraud has destroyed the reputation and credibility of the country all over the world. This has made it unnecessarily difficult for the majority of innocent Nigerians to transact business both locally and internationally,” says Mallam Ribadu, chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), the agency tasked with combating the scam. “In Nigeria today, ‘nobody trusts anybody, and everybody suspects everyone’. It is an indisputable fact that both at home and abroad, opportunities have been lost for lack of trust and confidence in business relationships with Nigerians.”
To tackle corruption, the EFCC’s first priority was to insulate the commission from corruption. Then, with the backing of Mr Obasanjo, it sent out the message that no-one is above the law.
Early successes included the arrest of a number of 419 kingpins. Presently, more than 500 suspects are in custody and assets worth more than $500m have been recovered or seized. More than 100 cases are at various stages of prosecution.
Clampdown on crime
The EFCC has also acted in other areas, identifying government agencies where corruption is rife. One example is the recent restructuring of the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS). Substantial revenue has been recovered from penalties levied on non- payment of import duties. Large quantities of smuggled goods have also been seized.
In the oil sector, Nigeria has saved more than $500m since 2002 through the efforts of the EFCC to curb oil sector theft and other illegal activities, including oil pipeline vandalism and fraud. More than 500 offenders are now behind bars.
And in the first six months of this year, the EFCC, working with the Federal Inland Revenue Service, recovered more than a N1bn ($7.5m) from several cases of fraud and tax evasion.
The EFCC also highlights Nigeria’s new Money Laundering Act, which it says clearly meets the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) baseline regulatory requirements of a standard anti-money laundering regime. The FATF is an Organisation for Economic
Co-operation and Development (OECD) body tasked with combating money laundering and terrorist financing. “We are certainly on our way to being removed from the FATF list of non-co-operative countries and territories,” says Mr Ribadu.
Connected to this, the EFCC has set up the Nigeria Financial Intelligence Unit, which will receive and analyse financial information such as currency transaction reports and suspicious transaction reports from financial institutions.
At the government’s other main anti-corruption agency, the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission’s (ICPC), 76 cases are being prosecuted including several high profile cases of ministers, top civil servants, and judges. And the ICPC legislation was amended to allow for accelerated prosecution.
Elsewhere, procurement reforms are being pursued to reduce the government’s operating costs and strengthen governance. The Due Process Unit of the Presidency, tasked with vetting government contracts, saved N110bn on 457 projects reviewed between 2002 and 2003. The saving arose from bloated cost quotations, says the unit’s head, Obiageli Ezekwesili.
Transparency efforts
The government’s other transparency initiatives include participation in the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) committing to an independent audit of the oil sector (including the government’s oil accounts, Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation and international oil companies) and participation in the G8 Transparency Initiative. And the authorities have begun publishing on a monthly basis the revenue sharing among the three tiers of government.
To strengthen its anti-corruption push, the government also increased resources to the EFCC, raising staff numbers from 80 to 315 and doubling the 2004 budget.
Yet critics contend that the government’s anti-corruption efforts are having little impact. Late last year, commentators seized on a report, purportedly from the World Bank, that alleged Nigerian government officials had more than $170bn in stolen funds stashed abroad, dwarfing Nigeria’s entire external debt burden. Fact or myth, it fuelled perceptions that corruption was out of control.
“So far, what is happening in Nigeria is that there has been an increasing awareness that corruption is counter productive to the progress and growth of a struggling nation like ours. But we have merely been talking about corruption and there has not been a very effective effort to reduce it,” Nduese Essien, chairman of the house committee on anti-corruption, national ethics and values, told a local newspaper.
Mr Ribadu does not mince his words. He told the Nigerian Bar Association national conference that corruption among law enforcement officers was a major constraint on the government’s anti-corruption campaign. He points out that while there are more than 200 Nigerians serving jail terms on 419 and other related offences all over the world, not a single person is serving a jail term for a 419-related charge in Nigeria. The EFCC believes that some of the 419 cases are being aided by highly placed corrupt government officials, thwarting investigations.
Overcoming resistance
There is no instant remedy. When Mr Obasanjo won presidential office in 1999, the first bill he sent to the national legislature proposed the creation of ICPC. Corruption, he said at the time, had exacted a heavy toll on the Nigerian state and frustrated development. The bill became law a year later, despite resistance from law-makers who wanted to weaken its impact.
What no-one disputes is that both the EFCC and ICPC are under-resourced. In the past four years, the ICPC has only been able to investigate half the cases brought before it and of those only 76 went to court.
“We have only 26 investigators and a very limited budget – in Hong Kong they have over 1000 investigators,” says Mustapha Akanbi, chairman of the ICPC, who has also had to battle numerous court challenges to the constitutionality of the ICPC. With four high court judges under investigation, the ICPC faces massive institutional resistance, including junior judges being bullied by more senior members of the judiciary,” says Mr Akanbi.
The ICPC was also hamstrung by the provision that prevented it from investigating any corrupt practices perpetrated before its creation in June 2000. This restriction effectively allowed some of the most corrupt officials to escape unchecked, especially members of the military governments of Ibrahim Babangida and Sani Abacha, known for particularly excessive levels of graft.
Progress is made
However slow, there is progress. In August, Nigeria’s law-making House of Representatives passed the Freedom of Access to Information Act, described by some commentators as “perhaps the most important bill in the fight against corruption”. The act’s final hurdle is to pass through the Senate before the president signs it into law. Journalists are punting it as potentially a watershed piece of legislation, enforcing transparency and open disclosure that will greatly assist in the investigative reporting of corrupt practices.
It fits with those like Mrs Ezekwesili, who do not believe that Nigerians are intrinsically immoral or unethical. Rather, corruption has taken root because the environment was permissive; install the necessary oversights and controls – the risk of being caught and punished – and corruption will be curbed, she believes.
In response to critics’ contention that anti-corruption measures are yielding too little, Mr Akanbi is philosophical. “These things depend on your point of view. In 20 years, no-one was prosecuted in court for corruption. Getting 76 cases to court is a giant first leap.
“If nothing else, people are realising it’s not business as usual.”
