PRESIDENT BUHARI’S ONE YEAR ANTI-CORRUPTION SCORE-CARD: A NEXUS BETWEEN ANTI-CORRUPTION AND DEVELOPMENT:
PRESIDENT BUHARI’S ONE YEAR ANTI-CORRUPTION SCORE-CARD: A NEXUS BETWEEN ANTI-CORRUPTION AND DEVELOPMENT:
By:
Nurudeen Dauda
May 29, 2016
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Interestingly, no religion condones corruption but surprisingly Nigeria has been described by some analysts as the most religious country in the world yet suffers from corruption. Some analysts argue that Nigerians are religious but ungodly. Corruption in Nigeria has almost become a “culture” where those who do not partake in the act are seen as “deviance” rather than “conformists”. Incorruptible people are seen as “fools” by some individuals.
Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, the pioneer Chairman of EFCC, was once reported to have said to those who had said that the “Anti-corruption war” under his watch was “selective” just as it was a “tool” for “political harassment”. In his response to the said allegation, he was said to have responded to those people by asking them to prove that the people charged were not corrupt. However, nobody had proved that the people charged were not corrupt.
However, the Nigerian “Public Service” system, in my humble opinion, is “porous” and corruption “induced” due to a lot of financial leakages allowed by the system. In my view, the best thing to do on fight against corruption is to stop its “perpetrations” from perpetrating the act. The public service leakages must be blocked. In the light of this, one would agree that the introduction of Treasury Single Account (TSA) is a good step in the right direction. The implementation of TSA would have stopped 80% 90% of financial corruption in the Public Service.
Garba Shehu, SA, Media to the President ,said: “At the last count, the president said he had saved the country money in excess of three (3) trillion naira which would otherwise have been wasted or shared, out to officials at the end of the financial year…” policy first of anti corruption…The delay in the coming of ministers was first to reduce the number of ministries, and then set a new of ground rules to stop the theft of government resources through systemic leakages…”-
The nexus between “Anti-corruption” and “development” is that common sense should have informed everyone that in a less corrupt regime the value of N1bilion worth of a contract might be equal to the value of N10billion contract in a regime of “stealing” is not “corruption” in term results. It is now obvious to many people that what led to the long lasting period of Insurgency in Nigeria was corruption. The insurgency that lasted for about 6 years due to corruption has now recorded a tremendous success within a year.
“…would anyone have thought that a Chief of Defense Staff, Service Chiefs, pretenders to thrones, the children of “natural rulers” including “toy” Sultans, Kings, Emirs and Chiefs will be brought to trial and kept in prisons? Ending Impunity is one of the key milestones of this administration. In one year of his administration, a miracle has happened, which is that there has been the total absence of multi –billion naira corruption scandals that characterized the previous administrations”- Garba Shehu, SA, Media to the President.
We have had scandals; such as: $20million Missing, N10billion Jet chartering, Stella Odua, Immigration Service, Fuel Subsidy, and Farouk Lawal bribery scandals etc.
“Corruption damages the very fabric of a nation. It has permeated all spheres of our national life and he (Buhari) is a man everybody believes is very transparent. The fight is not something being done behind closed door-people accept that they received certain amount of money and they have agreed to refund, and some have actually made the refund. This is a very transparent way of executing the war against corruption”- Senator Mohammed Abba Aji-Former Presidential Adviser on National Assembly matters to late President Umar Yar’adu.
Hamza Idris asked Senator Aji thus: The PDP alleges that the anti-corruption fight is one sided, don’t you think it is? “Well, that complaint is expected because PDP ruled since 1999 and, therefore, corruption is available to willing rulers”- Senator Aji. He, also, asked Senator Aji thus: Some of the PDP stalwarts are specifically angry over the probe of their campaign funds and nothing is being done on how the APC sourced its money to executive its campaign. “Yes, every political party used funds but this one that is being probed came from money budgeted for execution of war on terror. The money was allegedly traced to the office of National Security Adviser. The office is not the statutory source of fund for any political party because it is not a political organ and the money that was disbursed for the PDP campaign was clearly money that had been budgeted and provided statutorily for the execution of the war on terror. So, that in itself is a crime, because misapplying budgeted fund is a crime” - Senator Aji.
Hamza Idris further asked Senator Aji thus: Are you saying the APC is innocent?” You see, the current ruling party was not in government before, so it has no access to government fund, let alone the chance to misapply it. I agree that is only true at the national level. At the states, yes, there were APC governors and investigation is yet to reach that level. But as soon as we get to the state level, we shall see indictment of APC leaders as well. The president said that there is no sacred cow. So, at this stage, it is the federal level that is being investigated and it is the PDP that was in control of the national government before now”- Senator Aji.
In this country we once witnessed a period where paid youths protested against the arrest of their kins man for allegation of corruption. Those youths wrote on the placard that they held then thus: “He stole our money not yours, release him”. We equally witnessed a scenario where paid young girls demonstrated “naked” in front of a court demanding for the release of their kins man who was facing corruption trial.
President Buhari’s three major campaign promises were: Anti-corruption, Security and the economy. President Buhari is seen as the second person who fought corruption with sincerity in the country after late General Murtala Mohammed; President Buhari is fond of saying “If you don’t kill corruption, corruption will kill”. Let’s kill corruption before corruption kills us.
May God bless Nigeria!