Tag: anti-graft war

The government cannot successfully fight corruption unless citizens take ownership of the struggle, say legal experts at a roundtable organised by the Socio-Economic Right and Accountability Project (SERAP). JOSEPH JIBUEZE writes.

Corruption has devastating effects on majority of citizens. When resources meant for public health, security, welfare of the aged and education is diverted by a few, it is the citizens who suffer the consequences.

Yet, due to extreme poverty, ethnicity, lack of trust and belief in the leadership, and inadequate mobilisation, among others, many Nigerians do not see the fight against corruption as theirs. Some act as if it is government’s business alone.

But, legal experts at “the strategic dialogue on mobilising the citizens to demand anti-corruption reforms and an end to impunity for grand corruption in Nigeria,” organised by the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP), believe the anti-corruption war cannot be fought successfully without citizens’ support and buy-in.

Professor of International Law and Jurisprudence Akin Oyebode said despite all the hue and cry over the debilitating consequences of corruption, the virus has continued to fester.

According to  him,  it is not enough to have “fanciful” anti-corruption laws.

“More important is the need to get the generality of the popular masses wedded to the crusade in order to make it a success. The reticence and lethargy of our people generally would need to be confronted.  Without the cooperation and collaboration of generality of the people, the anti-corruption bodies might end up little more than paper tigers,” he said.

To Oyebode, a lot of work still needs to be done to ensure the understanding of requisite anti-corruption legislation and appreciation of the government’s commitment to its anti-corruption policy.

Most importantly, he said the people should be made aware of the nexus between corruption by the political leadership and their niggardly circumstances.

“Once they realise that misappropriation of the nation’s resources by leaders at various levels leads to their impoverishment, their approval and support for all measures adopted to contain graft and unjust enrichment within the polity become pretty well assured,” he said.

Next, he said the people should be enlisted in the war against corruption by encouraging them to engage in mass action through their participation in rallies, street demonstrations, public debates and writes-up in the mass media against corrupt practices.

More anti-corruption clubs need to be organised in the schools and higher educational institutions to collaborate in waging the anti-corruption struggle, he said.

According to him, citizens will be easily bought over to join the battle if they sense that it is sincere and devoid of double standards.

“No better encouragement and sensitisation against corruption exist more than the palpable resolve of the government to take decisive action against those who have been proved to violate the laws and social ethos against the odious and unwholesome practice of corruption.

“By effecting prompt and adequate sanction against acts of malfeasance, the anti-corruption crusade would win new and more committed converts among the population,” he said.

Religious bodies, churches and mosques, he said, should not be left out of the anti-corruption crusade.

“The leaders of religious organisations should be encouraged to be at the vanguard of the campaign against corrupt practices, more so as they exercise tremendous influence and impact among their various congregations,” he said.

According to Oyebode, Nigerians must no longer remain passive but must take ownership of the struggle.

“It is my considered opinion that the effort to contain corrupt practices should no longer be seen as just that of the government. Of equal if not, in fact, more important role is that of society which need to be on the same page if the anti-corruption war is to succeed.

“The efficacy of anti-corruption legislation coupled with judicial pronouncements and conviction and sentencing of corrupt elements would require the complement of mass action and commitment arising from general awareness and resolve to collaborate with on-going efforts.

“Inevitably, government action in this regard must be undertaken for the anti-corruption struggle to bear fruit,” he said.

Special Assistant to the President on Prosecution Okoi Obono-Obla described corruption as a tumor that has destroyed the socio-economic prospects of development in Nigeria since after independence.

According to him, in view of the devastating impact of corruption, there is every need to eradicate or at least minimise it.

“More disturbing is the contribution of corruption in creating a widening gap between the wealthy and the poor in our society. In terms of ‘inequality’, there exist a large and growing gap between the rich and the poor as more than 112 million Nigerians are living below poverty level,” he said.

Obono-Obla said corruption festered due to a weak and inept leadership in the past and an un-dying greed amongst the populace.

On its prevalence, he said: “Corruption lives amongst us and can be spotted in every sphere of the society- in Families, among friends, government offices, religious bodies, private sector, and as well as the educational sector.

Obono-Obla said Nigeria was once a society with conscience, where most citizens seriously frowned at criminal conduct and people were advised to disassociate themselves from criminal elements.

“But in today’s Nigeria the reverse is the case. It is only in Nigeria that criminals become heroes; given various chieftaincy titles, even recommended for National honours and honorary doctorate degrees of Universities are awarded based on stolen wealth from the public tilt, unmindful of the harm caused the nation by such people.

“We have even seen churches organising thanksgiving services for convicted criminals after serving their jail terms!” he said.

Obono-Obla said despite skepticisms, mobilising citizens can be a highly effective tool in combating corruption.

“The challenge is for the citizens to accept the task by building a social capital and effort until a tipping point is reached where being corrupt becomes too risky. As citizens, ours task is to play a crucial role of demanding transparency and accountability.

“We must also put pressure on government to end impunity for corruption to curb malfeasance by public officials. It is worthy of note that the citizen has the civic responsibility to monitor, analyse and report what they see and what actions state institutions like the Judiciary and others take on corruption cases.

“Citizens should shun their neighbors who show off with unearned wealth; who live in affluence and drive exotic automobiles without verifiable means of livelihood.

“It is the responsibility of citizens to whitsleblow a minister, director, commissioners or any public servant who suddenly become rich after appointment into government.  Citizens should cut their coat according to their sizes rather than pretending! Citizens should not wait to be paid incentives before reporting corruption

To achieve a successful anti-corruption strategy, the media must let the public to be aware of the alarming nature and levels of corruption in the interests of transparency, accountability, and integrity. Nigeria needs an informed public to make informed decisions,” Obono-Obla said.

To him, a major impediment to the anti-graft war is the people’s attitude to it, especially those who see it as political vendetta or selective political fight.

“This I strongly disagree. Combating corruption needs an all-inclusive approach of enforcement with prevention and detective measures, including enhanced whistleblower mechanisms.

“We must start working together to reinvent governance for the 21st Century; this we can achieve by supporting and aiding government institutions charged with such duties of stamping out corruption in our nation,” Obono-Obla said.

Speaking at the maiden strategic media roundtable dialogue on combating corruption and impunity organised by SERAP in February, A  senior lawyer, Tayo Oyetibo (SAN), regretted that due to poverty, many youths readily become willing tool in the hands of the politically exposed corrupt politicians, especially during elections.

Social perception, he said, also promotes corruption when the affluent flaunt their wealth, becoming a source of envy for many.

“Little or no regard is paid to how the wealth was acquired. Unfortunately, the craze to live big like my next door neighbour mentality often drive not a few to engage in corrupt practices with a view to acquiring undeserved wealth.

“For the political class, the gullibility of a great number of the populace serves as an incentive to these corrupt spoliators to continue in their corrupt practices whilst the public in general are denied qualitative education, affordable healthcare system, good road network and other public amenities,” he said.

According to the SAN, there is no paucity of anti-corruption laws in Nigeria. “We refuse to accept any postulation or notion that corruption is part of our culture in Nigeria. Rather, we are persuaded in our view that the inadequacies of the system and poor leadership have accentuated the problem of corruption in Nigeria,” he said.

Oyetibo said the citizens must speak up against corrupt practices and abhor them, considering their effect.

According to him, citizens have a “duty to speak up and act against corrupt practices so that a national value, ethos and principle, which abhor corruption in all ramifications would evolve”.

Senior Advocate of Nigeria Abdulhakeem Uthman Mustapha attended the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. He holds a Masters degree in International Business Law from the Suffolk Law School in Boston, United States. He also holds an MBA from the Business School, Netherlands, and has attended courses at Harvard Business School and Manchester Business School. In this interview with ERIC IKHILAE, he speaks on corruption, loot recovery and restructuring

How would you assess this government in relation to its adherence to the rule of law and obedience to court orders?

If you look at it from context of before 1999 when we had military rule and now, one could say substantial progress has been made.  There was a time when it was celebrated that the government has said it would obey court order. We have now passed that stage.  I think, where we are now, the government is relatively obeying court orders. Where that is not done, it is important for the people in government to know that it is in the interest of the government and the governed that rule of law should take precedence, and that we should obey court orders. If we don’t, it is a recipe for anarchy, and it is not acceptable.

On fight against corruption

Like I said earlier, corruption is a big monster that takes resources away from key sectors. When you want to fight something that is abnormal, at times, you need abnormal strategy. So far, I understand that a lot of money has been recovered. To that extent, the government has tried. However, there is a difference between fighting corruption and fighting corrupt people. Somebody drew my attention to this, that when the 9/11 incident happened, the US government set up a panel, which produced a four thousand- page document. And, they examined the infraction holistically and came up with recommendations on how to prevent a future occurrence. Fighting corruption would mean that you first identify the weaknesses and leakages in the system and come up with strategies to address them.  On the other hand, fighting corrupt persons is picking somebody up, checking his resources and taking back what he/her unlawfully acquired.  The two are important, but the one that is more important is fighting corruption. And, fighting corruption means that you put some structures in place.  You institutionalise some procedures that would prevent the occurrence of future infractions. In the area of fighting corruption, the government needs to improve more drastically.   So far, relatively, the government is doing its bit. Unlike before when there was so much impunity in government. If you are in government now and you want to do anything shady, you have to be very careful, because the thought that a Magu will come and pounce on you is enough deterrence.  So, to that extent, yes the government has done well, but it can be improved upon.

On difficulty retreiving looted funds

We need to understand something very well. The Western world talks about egalitarian society in the day and at night, they say something else. There are much impediments to the repatriation of these funds.  The resources are being used to develop their own countries. And if eventually, you pass through all the gamut of their procedure, they still take a chunk of the money for themselves.  We need to understand that they are reluctant to release these funds. So, we need new thinking, new ideas.  We need to be dynamic in our approach; we need to be realistic and practical. We also need to understand that the foreign governments are extremely reluctant to release this money.  I remember a time when the Swiss government told Nigeria that, well you have met all the conditions, but we want to know what you will spend the money on. That is an insult.  Somebody took our money to your country illegally, and you are now giving us conditions on what we should do with the money. That is not only insulting, they are infringing on our sovereignty. So, it boils down to the fact that we should fight corruption by making it difficult, if not impossible, for people to take our money abroad. That is the starting point.  We don’t have control over what the foreign governments will do with that money, but we have control over how this money should not be taken out.

On report that the judiciary comes next to the police in corruption ranking

I have been going to court all my adult life. This issue of corruption in the judiciary is like the case of one bad apple spoiling the whole basket. The bulk of Nigerian judges are very hard-working and are not corrupt. There are few individuals, and that happens in every society. Everybody cannot think the same way.  You should not forget that the Judiciary has an internal mechanism of cleansing the system and removing these bad people, once they are identified.  Like I said earlier, if we want to fight corruption, we should not expect the court to look for evidence to convict an accused person. It is the responsibility of another arm of government.  If there is corruption in the system, it should be investigated and anyone found guilty should be punished. The judges don’t have immunity.  So, the state should do its investigation properly. Not sting operation. The state should go out to get facts and evidence with which it can effectively prosecute anyone found to be involved in corruption.

On challenges of arbitration practice

The problem is the enforcement of awards. We need to look at that, because immediately an award is given the person who it is against, they will now go to court to challenge the award. And that makes nonsense of the whole process. I know of some banks that no longer put arbitration clause in their agreement, because they know that, instead of saving time, it wastes time and sometime compounds the problem.  So, we need a legislation or procedure that will make award final. What we do in this office and some other places is to make the award final. If the two parties know that they are sincere and are picking the arbitrator and the referees in a very fair and just manner, then the award should be final.

On how to make the system work

I want to thank the eight National Assembly for introducing the independent candidacy option. I hope it will encourage some people to come out without going through the rigour of party primaries that are often bedevilled with corruption. In terms of restructuring, yes. I think the centre appears to be too large. And the resources there appears to be too much. It is my opinion that things like state policing should be allowed.  If the governors want to tell you the truth, you will find that they fund most of the police operations in their states. But, they do not have control over the same police. Nobody can deny that there might be abuses here and there. I remember that, before the broadcast and aviation industries were deregulated, people expressed fear that the private investors could abuse the privilege. But, we are wiser today. If we allow state policing, in my opi nion, I think Nigeria will be better policed. So, restructuring, yes. But, we need to look at the fact that the major problem of Nigeria is leadership.

On returning to 1963 Constitution

Definitely the presidential system of government is too expensive for a country like ours.  I think a hybrid of some of the provisions in this Constitution and what you have in that of 1963, with a little devolution of power to the states will do. But, we need to be careful.  Currently, at the federal level, we have some semblance of checks and balances. We have the National Assembly that sometimes, calls the Executive to order. But, with respect, and I stand to be corrected, that is not the situation in most of the states.  The state Assemblies are like appendages or parastatals under the Executive. If we retain this current structure and we devolve more power and resources to the state level, we might be worse off than we are now.  So, we need to separate the noise from the real issues and understand what we want. We should not allow this bandwagon to push us into taking a decision, so that we do not end up like the Brexit. We need to be sure that we are making the right choice.

On the best system

I think it is a hybrid. The parliamentary system works better in a way, because if you are part of the executive and you are a legislator, you are forced to understand the problems and dynamics of the society. And you have to be substantially prepared.  With respect, a lot of our legislators are absentees. They hardly go to the place. So, in my opinion, a hybrid of that will work. I also think we need to look at the area of whether we need to have the Senate and the House of Representatives at the same time with our current resources. Frankly, we need to review the structure that we currently operate. Because it is not delivering and it is taking too much of our resources. We should restructure to reflect true federalism, where some of the items in the Exclusive Legislative List are devolved to the Concurrent List. But, more importantly, we need to look at the drivers of the system if we really want to move forward.

On IPOB’s proscription

We need to look at it from the angles of strict legal and social.  In terms of legal requirement, the impression I have is that IPOB is registered in Nigeria. Under the Terrorism Act, the provision for how an organisation can be declared a terrorist organisation is very clear.  What the Nigerian Army did was wrong. I think they later came out to say they didn’t say that much. It is for the Attorney General or the National Security Adviser (NSA) to approach the court. And that has been done from the legal perspective; safe for the fact that IPOB is alleged not to be registered in Nigeria. But, that is a different thing entirely. If it is not registered in Nigeria, then Nigerian court does not have jurisdiction on it.  But, the reality is that there is IPOB in Nigeria, whether it is registered or not is a different thing entirely. From social point of view, there is a school of thought the believe that the activities of Boko Haram would have been severely curtailed if there was a timely action on the part of the government. So, to that extent, may be outlawing IPOB would have been a precautionary measure.  There is no part of this country that I have not travelled to. I have more friends who are Igbos, and I am from Ilorin. Nigerians, we have come to leave with each other. It is just like Prof Chinua Achebe said, that we are neighbours and nobody will go for each other. If you look at the real sector of Nigerian economy, from the motor parks to where you buy auto spare parts, to the garages, Nigerians have integrated. We all are affected by the same problems, which include poverty, lack of infrastructure and leadership deficit.

On national character

That is very relative. You need to look at successive governments and how these appointments are done, because there is a constitutional provision as to representation, whether ministerial or in other capacities. That, to me, has been fulfilled. It is part of the corruption in the system for you to say one ministry is juicy and the other is not. We should discard such habit. It is very nauseating. We are about 180 million Nigerians. We should always pick the best to represent us, irrespective of where he/she comes from. We need to get to a stage in Nigeria where we will allow competence to take precedence. The problem with Nigeria is leadership. The earlier we address it, the better for us.

On Constitution amendment

The Constitution is, more or less, an agreement. It is a document that needs to be reviewed from time to time. The original American constitution has been so amended that there is no one single clause in that constitution that has not been visited one time or the other. In Nigeria, it has been amendment today, tomorrow and the next. What we need is that we should allow the Constitution to work. We have not really given it time before we say we are amending again. Amending the Constitution or document, in appropriate cases, is not bad. But, if the players are sincere and put the society above their own interest, it is a document we can all work with. It can be amended from time to time, but it is not a document that we can holistically say is not good. May be, in appropriate cases, the amendment could be few times, otherwise it defeats one of the features of law, which is that law must be certain. If you amend today, and three to six months after, you are talking of amendment, it would not augur well for anybody.

On special courts

The initiative is a good one. It is well overdue. For those familiar with court system in other jurisdictions, there are specialised courts that handle things. In fact, if you look at the evolutionary nature of arbitration, it is because there are some specialised issues that the conventional court might really not understand, and you need a specialised court to be able to address it. So, setting up special courts that would try corruption cases is a fantastic idea. We need to understand that corruption takes resources away from the critical sectors, like heath care, roads, education, among others, and put them in individuals’ hands. And, it gets to a stage where individuals, via corruption, become bigger than the state. That becomes a big challenge. So, anything that will curb excesses or arrest the issue of corruption in Nigeria should be a welcome development.

On tackling delays

Much more still need to be done, particularly on the part of the prosecutors. The idea of arresting before looking for evidence is wrong. It does not work anywhere. The state counsel need to do their homework very well. They need to do more of forensic investigation. The world has gone beyond the archaic way our people conduct investigation here. They need to learn to deploy more of information and communication technologies to conduct forensic investigation. More importantly, the courts need infrastructure. Most of our courts lack the necessary facilities. The idea of a judge recording proceedings in long hand is completely unacceptable. If you go to some African countries like Ghana, Togo and Kenya, they have gone beyond that. If Nigerians wants to fight corruption, they should blame the judiciary less. They should address the infrastructural decay in the judiciary and see whether or not it will perform. It is only when the court is appropriately funded that it can deliver on its mandate. Secondly, it is important that we understand that the judiciary is an arm of the government and not a parastatal under the executive. The need to uphold the independence of the judiciary is quite important. What goes around comes around. The man, who is in the executive today may need the service of the court tomorrow. So, it is in our collective interest to ensure that the Judiciary is properly funded and is allowed its independence, to be able to protect the interests and rights of everybody, and to protect the rule of law.

On disobedience to court orders

You see, if the decisions of courts are not obeyed, it is certainly a prelude to anarchy. It is not the responsibility of the court to enforce its judgment. That is the duty of the law enforcement agencies. It is condemnable and dangerous for any agency or arm of government not to obey court orders.

On Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA)

I think the law is revolutionary. Two years is too short for one to fully assess it. Some of its provisions would have to be given judicial interpretations. But, it is a right in the right direction, especially in criminal prosecution. The ACJA has addressed the idea of interlocutory appeal that could stall the prosecution of cases. There are other so many revolutionary aspects of the law. The issue of bail is a constitutional one. You are presumed innocent until the contrary is proved. Before the advent of the ACJA, it was not very clear. But, with the Act, it is now almost compulsory that a defendant is entitled to bail. So, there are so many salutary provisions in it that is revolutionary. But, like I said, it is still at its evolutionary stage. I am happy that the provision that, interlocutory appeal should not stall proceedings, has been given a judicial stamp by the Supreme Court.

On decongesting the courts

Like I said, it is still very early. But, I think in the context of expeditious criminal prosecution, yes. But, the congesting of courts is not so much of the provisions of law. It is more of the arrest, prosecution and even the prison system, which to my mind, is very archaic and needs to be changed. If the police are still investigating a matter, the person should be entitled to bail. More than half of the inmates in our prisons today are suspects. Some of them might have been grated administrative bail at the police level, but they are unable to meet the condition. If somebody is selling pure water and you ask him/her to bring a surety that has two or three million naira, that is not fair. That is even contrary to the presumption of innocent.