The Nation Newspaper

Tag: corruption

  • ‘Importation of substandard goods part of corruption’

    ‘Importation of substandard goods part of corruption’

    The Coordinator, Standard Organisation of Nigeria (SON) in Osun, Mr Sunday Badewole, has described importation of substandard goods into Nigeria as an integral part of the corruption that should be tackled.

    Speaking in Osogbo, Osun State capital, Badewole described the importation of substandard goods as stealing with style, saying: “By importing substandard goods, it means you want to defraud the people, and when you defraud people of their money, it is part of corruption.

    “It is stealing with style, and it must be reduced to the barest minimum in our society.”

    Badewole decried the influx of substandard products through the nation’s porous borders.

    He said that SON would not relent on the enforcement of standards and standardisation of products in the markets.

    The coordinator said that the organisation would organise a public enlightenment workshop for importers and consumers on the need to avoid buying and selling fake products.

    Badewole said that the organisation was already collaborating with the state government on the formation of “Standards Club’’ in both primary and secondary schools in the state.

    The SON coordinator said that the club would be a forum to engage and educate youths on the ethics, values and virtues of standards in products.

    Badewole said that it would assist them as adults to know the danger of importing substandard goods.

    “The real change must begin with the young ones and that is why we are taking the campaign on standard and standardisation to schools.”

  • Corruption, firstborn of indiscipline, says Ajakaye

    The Catholic Bishop of Ekiti Diocese, Rev. Felix Ajakaye, has described corruption as “the firstborn of indiscipline in Nigeria.”

    The cleric said this on Saturday at the public presentation and launch of his book titled: Beyond Ideas, at St. Patrick’s Catholic Cathedral, Old Garage, Ado Ekiti.

    The book has six parts, including religion, socio-political issues, sports, talks, interviews and others.

    He said corruption grew because the nation’s leaders failed to tackle the indiscipline, which later bore the fruit of corruption witnessed in the country.

    The bishop advised the Federal Government to refrain from media trial in its resolve to stamp out corruption.

    According to him, “media prosecution will lead the nation to nowhere.”

    Ajakaye advocated implementation of the recommendations of the 2014 National Conference, saying: “We need to revisit it. The report  would make our country, Nigeria, a better place”.

    He explained that the book is for positive and concrete actions, for a new Nigeria and Nigerians in their dealings with one another.

    “We  need to face meaningful actions rather than chasing shadows in our actions.

    “Nigeria must not fall, Nigeria must not fail. If Nigeria falls or fails, we have fallen and failed as a people.”

    Presenting the book, Minister of Mines and Steel Development Kayode Fayemi said knowledge without character is meaningless to the society.

    Fayemi described the bishop’s latest  work as a compendium of creativity, knowledge and reflection.

    In his remarks, Catholic Archbishop of Ibadan Ecclesiastical Province, Rev. Gabriel Abegunrin, counselled Nigerians to talk positively, think positively and act positively to make the nation a better place.

    The book reviewer, Prof. Isaac Obasi, noted that Beyond Ideas touches the heart of every Nigerian, particularly lovers of social justice in present-day Nigeria ravaged by what he called “pervasive corruption in governance”.

    Obasi, who is a lecturer at the University of Abuja, noted that Beyond Ideas is also a gentle protest and criticism on the prevailing governance crisis in Nigeria.

  • Of corruption and impunity

    Conventional morality is absolute: a thief is a thief, and an outlaw to boot. There are very few mitigating circumstances to make a thief into a hero, as in the mould of British folklore legend, Robin Hood, who robbed the rich aggressively just to provide for the needy poor. If a thief is duly proven to be one, he justifiably becomes the butt of society’s rage and opprobrium. He stands condemned and consigned to the thresher of societal amorality.

    But justice requires that a thief be sufficiently proven as one, to be rightly condemned and crucified – metaphorically, I mean. Short of discharging the burden of proof, condemning and crucifying a purported thief could be tantamount to the notorious witch-hunts of early Modern Europe when all it required to literally burn an adversary – even an innocent one – at the stakes was to publicly accuse him or her of sorcery, and consequently instigate mob hysteria and moral outrage in the public that would see such a one haplessly through to being frantically lighted up on erected stakes, with scant opportunity allowed for being heard in self-defence.

    Corruption is a reprehensible violation of societal moral ethic, and a particularly destructive cancer in the history of the Nigerian nationhood. But while we mustn’t countenance indulging this insidious violation, care must be taken as well not to idly savage reputations as would amount to modern-day witch-hunts in our quest for justice. Perhaps that is why the provisions of contemporary law presume innocence, sometimes assly so, even for obvious rogues until they are proven guilty.

    Unfortunately, the issue of judges lately accused of corruption in the Nigerian judiciary seems to me rapidly unfolding as a mutual witch-hunt between the accused persons on the one hand and their accuser, the Muhammadu Buhari administration, on the other. The judges’ homes were raided some fortnight ago by operatives of the Department of State Security (DSS), who eventually afforded the public a rare insight into veritable cash vaults that their Lordships’ homes had become. In carrying out their mission, the DSS operatives struck Gestapo-style in the dead of night, broke down walls and pulled doors off their hinges to execute search warrants that were to uncover mind-boggling cash piles in local and foreign currencies, among other things, before they hauled eight judges off into detention. Among those arrested were two Supreme Court justices. The security operatives were alleged to have also terrorized family members of the targeted judges.

    There have been furious questions about the propriety of the procedure adopted by DSS operatives in executing their mission, especially in view of constitutional stipulation of separation of powers between the different arms of government and the dispensational context, namely a democracy. Let me be very clear here: I raise those questions strongly myself. Civil liberty is endangered when arms-wielding security agents invade homes of unarmed citizens in the dead of night and haul them into detention on mere suspicion that those citizens were involved in whatever crime. This is not a martial state. Whatever happened to statutory presumption of innocence until guilt is proven? Some have argued that a good number of citizens had been victims of lawless security culture, and judges who have corruption cases to answer should not be treated any different. But democratization of lawlessness does not make the lawless act lawful, neither does compounding impunity relieve the aberration against collective morality. Everyone as they say is equal before the law, not necessarily so before a travesty of the law.

    Few persons would, however, dispute the urgent imperative of tackling the cancer of corruption in the Nigerian Judiciary. Citizens are largely agreed that there are corrupt judges in that hallowed institution, a reality that recommends drastic remedial intervention. And it seems fairly in consensus that the National Judicial Council (NJC), which is empowered by law to discipline erring judges, is notoriously lame in doing just that. Some persons would argue that the NJC’s feebleness is by conscious design, though it well seems a case of genuine inadequacy of the council’s enabling statutes. Whichever it is, public frustration with the NJC appears fairly widespread, and so, not a few cheered the desecration of the Judiciary by impudent security operatives when they raided the judges’ home and herded them into detention.

    Here, for me, is the catch though: more than two weeks after, the factors involved in the crackdown against accused judges seem rather hazy. There has been a good dose of recriminations between the Judiciary and the DSS ever since, but the accused judges have been proven neither guilty nor innocent. They were allowed back home on administrative bail many hours after their arrest, and they are yet to be arraigned for prosecution on clearly articulated charges. You would think the DSS already had its cases wrapped up for prosecution when it moved against the judges, only we now hear investigations are still ongoing and specific charges yet being unraveled. So, on what ground was the crackdown?

    But the state of indeterminacy has not constrained character arsonists, leading Justice officials of the Executive arm among them, from preemptive media trial of the judges and strident calls for their pre-trial sanction. The accused judges, for their part, have shaken off the time-honoured tradition of reticence and are bandying counter-accusations against the Executive, ranging from alleged persecution for duly considered verdicts that did not favour the government, to victimization for outright rebuff of brazen overtures to bribe their Lordships. They are invoking specific names, including that of Mr. President, and suggesting corroboration by named actors including the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN). See the mutual witch-hunt?

    My guess is that the government delays in dragging the accused judges before the law partly because the DSS took a blind leap with its bullish raid on the judges’ homes two weeks ago. I have been informed by senior lawyers, who should know, that the DSS is not a prosecuting agency like the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), for instance. Many Nigerians have questioned whether the mandate of the DSS, as spelt out by its enabling law, includes waging civil anti-graft operations. And I dare say it is worse that the Department undertook a solo crackdown against accused judges that it has no statutory powers to prosecute, yet it did not take enabled prosecuting agencies like the EFCC on board. Apparently, the government must now devise a peculiar arrangement outside the DSS to take the accused judges before the law. And that, obviously, requires some time.

    Another factor is that the ground on which to push the judges’ prosecution seems effectively shifty, as the collectively indicted Judiciary is also the official adjudicator in the impending cases. There is the time-honoured sanctity of professional ethic of judicial practice, and I am not suggesting that the institution would throw such ethic overboard just because some of its own are in the dock. But where is the neutrality that should inform the dispassion of the arbiter?

    That is the reason I consider it awkward that many of their Lordships who have been accused of corruption remain on the Bench, while their investigation and eventual prosecution pend and they are only out on administrative bail. Only last week, one of the judges presided over a number of suits and later stood down when the case involving former National Security Adviser (NSA) Sambo Dasuki, who is being prosecuted by the EFCC but is held in defiance of court orders by the DSS, came up for hearing. I just wonder: how does it feel for an accused person to stand before a judge who himself is an accused person only out on bail? Even if the NJC would not suspend them, personal honour and professional integrity demand that their Lordships step down from the Bench until the allegations against them are proven one way or the other.

  • Still on corruption in the Nigerian Judiciary

    Still on corruption in the Nigerian Judiciary

    Now, it is only if you want to be kind to these judges, that you would question only their competences; their training and experience but, without a doubt, much more is involved.

    As in all sectors of the Nigerian society, corruption predominates the judiciary. It has become endemic and it did not start today. It has elicited this amount of hoopla simply because one had expected that these priests in the temple of justice should, at least, be the exception. And there are, of course, those members of the judiciary who over dramatise their unjustified angst against the method of arresting the judges even where extant laws are not breached. The following anecdotal story, the veracity of which I cannot guarantee, will confirm the above assertion even where the consideration was certainly not money, but friendship.

    According to the story, the government of Western Region had just acquired a piece of land at Idi-Ose for the use of IITA in Ibadan. Some of the land-owners,  not happy with the amount of compensation paid, threatened to go to court, which development Chief Ladoke Akintola reported to Awo and advised that the matter be resolved without  litigation. Awo, the story goes, disagreed, confident that the government had a solid legal team in FRA Williams, Fani-Kayode and Bode Thomas. SLA replied in Yoruba, suffused with panegyrics: “My Leader, e fura o. Looto ‘Timi mo Procedure. Oba ni Fani ninu Constitution, beeni Thomas o kere ninu Evidence. Sugbon TOS Benson ni lawyer awon ti a n so yi. E si mo pe TOS mo Ademola o”- meaning yes, these are terrific lawyers, but TOS Benson and Justice Ademola, handling the case, are friends o.”

    Awo got the message and opted for settlement.

    Lesson of this: while the brilliant lawyer knows the Law, the successful one knows the Judge.

    The above story should confirm that the article below, published on these pages on Sunday, 16 June 2013, but slightly edited for space, is/was not ethnically motivated but simply a narration of the evidence of our very eyes in an era when some demonic senior Yoruba members of the bar and the bench, serving and retired, wrote or vetted, decisions of Election Tribunals in Yoruba land, whose membership was composed, wholly of, or had, at least two members from the north.

    NORTHERN JUDGES AS WEAKEST LINK IN A CORRUPT NIGERIAN JUDICIARY

    Justice being so sacred and divine, I never thought a day would come when I would have to write about the Nigerian judiciary in this deprecating manner. Never. But what we have in Nigeria today is a mere caricature – a judiciary brought low by its own shenanigans; so nauseating you simply have no apologies. It is for this that Justice Hardy, in sentencing Ibori’s crime couriers in a London court, could not restrain himself from describing the Nigerian judiciary as one usurped by men of power: Obas, Obis, Emirs, former Heads of State and sundry men of money and power, including state governors. In spite of the federal character nature of the menace, in which no section of the country can claim innocence, one can, with considerable justification, claim that judges of northern extraction have proved to be extremely weak and pliable, proving without a shadow of doubt, that they constitute the weakest link in a weak and corrupt judiciary.

    There are too many instances to cite from in support of this heavy charge against northern Judges  but nothing will compare with the  in-your-face sacrilege committed by the three northern judges who concocted the decision in the Aregbesola vs. Olagunsoye Oyinlola case at the Osun Election Petitions Tribunal nor would any judicial summersault ever thump what they did in their findings on the crucial issue of one Alhaji  S.O Nofiu who signed Forms EC8B in nine out of eleven wards in Ife Central Local Government Area of the state. Curiously, but understandably, the tribunal would later request that the defence lawyers return the Certified True Copy of the judgment which they had proactively obtained immediately after the court’s pronouncement. We have an NGO, the JUSTICE NOW FOUNDATION, to thank for bringing this ringing judicial odium to the open. In an advertorial in THE NATION of  Monday, 7 June 2010, the NGO wrote as follows:

    “…on that page, the tribunal judges made two contradictory findings as regards the evidence of signing of forms EC8B in nine out of eleven wards in Ife Central Local Government Area by one Alhaji N.O Nofiu. In the upper paragraph, the tribunal wrote: ‘In respect of Ife Central LG, evidence was led in the open court and our attention was drawn to Form EC8B in 9 wards out of 11 in the LG, and after perusing we confirmed that the said Alhaji N.O Nofiu signed the forms EC8B and no reason was advanced by the Respondents to explain why that happened. We are therefore of the view that this is a clear case of irregularity.” Curiously, in the second paragraph which now subsisted, the tribunal made a somersault and shamelessly wrote: ‘In respect of the allegation that Alhaji N.O Nofiu signed 9 form EC8B in the Ife Central LG, the Petitioner referred us to the evidence of RW29 and RW42 who stated under cross examination that he is the PDP Secretary, and we have gone through that evidence, but we could not find where they were confronted with forms EC8B’s in relation to the said wards of the local government. There must be an oral evidence to link the documentary evidence which is lacking here.’

    You can be sure one of those Yoruba legal evil geniuses has intervened.

    The NGO then asks: ‘Is this the way judicial minds work, finding irregularity in one breath and having a quick rethink and holding that there is no evidence in another, thus approbating and reprobating at the same time? Why did Alli Garba and the other Judges later shut their eyes, on the same page of the judgment ,to the glaring irregularity that they had earlier found in the signing of the forms by  one  person whom the Respondent’s witnesses confirmed was the Secretary of the PDP in Ife Central LG?’

    In Agagu Vs Mimiko, the Court of Appeal held that the court has the power to take judicial notice of  geographical divisions of the  ward and in that case, the tribunal rightly took judicial notice of the boundary lines of wards and the distance between the collation centre and others and found that one of the polling agents of the appellant’s political party who signed Form EC8B for three electoral wards that are several kilometres apart could  not have signed the forms at the ward collation centres because collation of the results of  all electoral units into Form EC8B was supposed to be done at the same time at all the collation centres. The Court of Appeal therefore held that the Tribunal rightly nullified the results of the three wards. Concluded the Foundation: ‘Clearly, Alli Garba and his colleague Judges from the north, had to abandon their earlier finding which would have led automatically to the nullification of 53,882 votes from  Oyinlola’s votes as against 3,883 from Aregbesola’s in that LG area alone”.

    Now, it is only if you want to be kind to these judges, that you would question only their competences; their training and experience but, without a doubt, much more is involved. It is, therefore, suspected in serious quarters, that for purposes of gratification, initial decisions of judges from the north are most probably submitted to a cabal of their evilly minded senior colleagues from the south, where the latter had not, in fact, written it in the first instance, and merely submitted to their lordships for pronouncement. But they were not yet done as Justice Alli Garba and co had equally turned blind eyes to blank Forms EC8B, as well as unsigned and unstamped forms EC8A in Odo Otin LG, tendered as Exhibit R18 because that, again, would have led them to nullify another batch of  43, 606 unlawful and unmerited votes posted for Oyinlola in his native Odo-Otin LG. When you add the antics, and judgment, of Justice Bwala in the first Ekiti Tribunal which was unceremoniously thumped by the Court of Appeal sitting in Ilorin, and the shenanigans of Justice Naron and the Hammar wayo in Ekiti, about which I have written copiously, you will be too generous, if not foolish, to ascribe these judgments to anything other than corruption.

    Why is this article relevant today?

    Simple. It is the fact that northern judges form a preponderance of those currently under investigation and that speaks to their mode of appointment to the higher bench which sees them barely reaching the mandatory ten-year post-graduation before appointment. They then quickly transfer to the federal judiciary where they, again, enjoy rapid promotion, a situation which has resulted in the north dominating that arm of government for like ages. Unfortunately, due to the hold of traditional institutions on northern appointees, punishing them has become very herculean. In order to correct all these, decisive efforts must be made to standardise appointments into the higher reaches of the Nigerian judiciary.

  • Judges: ‘Corruption is fighting back with uncommon ferocity’

    The Rivers State Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Chris Finebone, has described the allegations leveled against the Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, by the arrested Justices of Supreme Court, Justices John Inyang Okoro and Nwali Sylvester Ngwuta, as a case of corruption fighting back with an uncommon ferocity, never known before.

    Finebone, who spoke yesterday in Port Harcourt, the state capital, noted that as soon as operatives of the Department of State Services (DSS), in obedience to relevant laws of Nigeria relating to arrest and detention, released the arrested justices on personal recognition within 24 hours of arrest, they started to level frivolous, baseless and spurious allegations against eminent Nigerians, including Amaechi.

    He stated that he and other members of the party were worried about the ugly turn of events in the country on the corruption saga, considering the peculiar tendencies of countrymen to convolute the air, especially when caught in the act of doing evil.

    Rivers Publicity Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Samuel Nwanosike, however, declared that Amaechi, a former Rivers State Governor and ex-Chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF), should resign and be properly investigated.

    Finebone said: “The bursting of judicial corruption in Nigeria was unheard of and probably thought of as impossible before now. The major concern is that those arrested and released so swiftly will have sufficient time and company of evil associates, who will present to them pages and options of scripts taken from their ignoble book of mischief on how to fight back. They will also provide legal assistance and deep purses to take the fight to President Muhammadu Buhari and his government.”

  • Ekweremadu seeks public hearings for national budgets

    Ekweremadu seeks public hearings for national budgets

    Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu Wednesday said national budget proposals should be subjected to public hearings.

    He said public scrutiny would reduce the corruption associated with the budgeting process and will improve transparency.

    It will also enable the citizens make direct input on areas in need of attention, he said.

    Ekweremadu spoke in Abuja on the second day of the national conference on “Role of the Legislature in the fight against Corruption”, organised by Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption (PACAC) and the joint Senate and House of Representatives Committee on Anti-corruption, in collaboration with the European Union, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the Africa Development Studies Center.

    Ekweremadu, who chaired a session, said Nigeria is perceived as a corrupt nation partly because its budgeting processes are not transparent enough.

    He said: “We are one of the few countries that don’t subject our budgets to public hearings. I don’t see why Appropriation Bills should not be sent in early by the executive so that the public can contribute.

    “The problem has always been that the executive brings budget proposals at the last minute, usually at the end of a financial year, leaving no room for public input,” he said.

    PACAC’s Executive Secretary, Prof Bolaji Owasanoye, urged the National Assembly to make its budgets public for the sake of transparency and accountability.

    He said the lawmakers should justify to Nigerians the fact that there has been over 2,220 per cent increase in National Assembly’s budget between 1999 and 2014.

    Owasanoye said the number of lawmakers has not increased, nor has the salaries of other workers increased, yet their budget rose from N6.9billion in 1999 to N150billion in 2014.

    According to him, National Assembly’s budget was N6.9billion in 1999, N9.9billion in 2000, N19.8billion in 2001, N21.6billion in 2002, N24.3billion in 2003, N34.7billion in 2004, N55.4billion in 2005, N60billion in 2007, N106billion in 2009 and N154.3billion in 2010.

    Owasanoye accused the lawmakers of competing with the executive rather than focusing on their core mandates of lawmaking and oversight duties.

    “The National Assembly, just like the judiciary, does not account to anybody for how it spends money. It’s a big problem. The arm of government to help us deal with that is the legislature.

    “But for several years they’ve been collecting over N100billion, they’ve not accounted to anybody. They have to justify it to us. That is the only way to remove the negative perception that that the National Assembly is corrupt.

    “On constituency projects, which I have no aversion for, in the majority of cases, unless we want to live in denial, a legislator wants to nominate or succeeds in totally hijacking the contract.

    “So, the National Assembly should stop competing with the executive for budget increases,” Owasanoye said.

  • Corruption needs no conference

    A curious two-day conference will be held in Abuja on October 18 and 19. It is curiously called “National Conference on the role of the legislature in the fight against corruption in Nigeria.” More curiously, it is organised by the Joint Senate and House of Representatives Committee on Anti-Corruption and the Presidential Advisory Committee against Corruption (PACAC) in collaboration with the European Union, The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimes (UNODC) and the Africa Development Studies Center (ADSC).

    Among the curious high-profile participants expected at the conference are Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, Senate President Bukola Saraki and Speaker of the House of Representatives Yakubu Dogara. Others are the Chairman, Senate Committee on Anti-Corruption and Financial Crimes, Chukwuka  Utazi, the Chairman, House Committee on Anti-Corruption, Babajide Akinloye, and the PACAC Chairman, Prof. Itse Sagay.

    It is unclear whether the forum is intended to school the country’s federal legislators in the fundamentals of anti-corruption. It is worth noting that the Director General, Kenya School of Law, Prof. P. L.O. Lumumba, is expected to shed some light on the subject.

    Without doubt, it is one thing to be taught and another thing to be teachable. Perhaps the greatest challenge facing the targets of this training programme of sorts is not their learning capacity but their capacity for unlearning and relearning.  It has been observed that knowledge is incomplete without values, and the lawmakers have continued to demonstrate to the public that they may indeed be irredeemably challenged in that critical department.

    To give a striking illustration, consider the loud and clear voice of the beleaguered former Chairman of the House Committee on Appropriation, Abdulmumin Jibrin, who has been singing about the alleged rot and stench in the House of Representatives. Who is listening to Jibrin?

    In an interview published on October 9, Jibrin declared: “The corruption in the House of Representatives is massive. I have not exposed more than 10 per cent of the corruption going on in the House of Representatives. It is that bad.”

    Jibrin continued: “I have said a whistleblower is not necessarily a saint. But people often support him (a whistleblower) because what he reveals is usually beneficial to all. This issue is beyond Jibrin. If someone has any issue against Jibrin, he should write a petition and take it to the anti-corruption agencies. I will go to the agencies and respond to the petition. Nobody among the 359 members of the House has written a petition against me to the anti-graft agencies. I had written a petition against the Speaker and three other principal officers in the House. I am talking about people who committed budget fraud of N40bn, another budget fraud worth about N20bn and there is another budget fraud with a cumulative sum of N284bn. I am talking about a person who diverted Federal Government projects to his farm; short-changed members in the N10bn Sustainable Development Goal projects of 2015; used subterranean means to create a new House rule that is the subject of litigation; and a man who collects rent from multiple sources. I have also exposed the fact that members are collecting votes for running costs. I am not saying money should not be voted for lawmakers’ running costs. The point is that this money is (sometimes) diverted to private pockets.”

    Is anyone listening to Jibrin?  It is food for thought that those on the receiving end of his accusations are likely to be at the planned anti-corruption conference in the capital city this week. The accused have done little or nothing to prove that Jibrin does not know what he is talking about. Those who should investigate Jibrin’s weighty allegations have done little or nothing to disprove his scandalous claims. With the move by the House of Representatives to tame Jibrin through a controversial long-term suspension, it would appear that the battle has been lost and won, even though the hurly-burly is not over.

    Jibrin’s response to his 180-day suspension: “The constitution is clear: you can only get a member out of the House through recall and the constitution is supreme. The Legislative Privileges Act only allows the House to suspend a member for one sitting day. The House rules stipulate that you can only suspend a member for only 14 days. Therefore, legally, there is no way this can stand. They only suspended me because they wanted to save face. I raised allegations, but they have not responded.”

    Evidently, the anti-corruption fight cannot be fought by fighters who are themselves pro-corruption. On the question of the incompleteness of knowledge without values, another striking picture reinforces the failure of values in the federal legislature.

    A September 19 report on cheating by members of the National Assembly said: “NAN gathered that some of the lawmakers, especially principal officers, have more than the statutorily approved number of aides in their employ, who also draw their salary from the assembly’s funds…It was also revealed that many legislators draw the emolument of their aides from the assembly’s funds but pay them fractions. Some of the lawmakers employed only one or two aides but are collecting the full salary for the five they are entitled to.”

    The report continued: “This act was discovered to be perpetrated more by the members through their constituency offices, which they are mandatorily expected to have in their areas, but deliberately failed to do so. They submit names of non-existent staff in the constituency office to the national assembly service commission and collect their entitlements directly.”

    It is noteworthy that these are the characters expected to play a positive role in the fight against corruption in Nigeria. What will they learn at the coming conference? What can they learn? How will the results of the teaching be measured and monitored?

    In the end, this publicised conference may be no more than another stunt to create the impression that corruption is unwelcome in the National Assembly when there are enough signs that corruption enjoys a warm welcome in that supposedly honourable  space. Indeed, it is not far-fetched to observe that corruption usually gets the red-carpet treatment from members of the National Assembly. What the fight against corruption needs is not a conference but conscience.

     

  • Corruption: House of Reps partners UK, accounting organisations

    Corruption: House of Reps partners UK, accounting organisations

    The House of Representatives has reiterated readiness to curb wastages and other forms of corruption in the utilisation and application of public funds.

    Chairman, Public Accounts, (PAC), Kingsley Chinda said his Committee is partnering Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy -UK and Periscope Consulting Limited, a Nigerian public financial management firm.

    Chinda, while receiving the delegation at the National Assembly last week, regretted that the country is faced with challenges of corruption, weak structures and transparency.

    He however stressed that the government is determined to put in sustained structures that cannot be washed away too soon.

    “That is the reason we try to make utilisation of public funds a public document through regular engagement of the Auditor General of the Federation at our meetings.

    “Together with Senate PAC, we are looking at how to strengthen all State PACs so that we can be on same page.

    “It is in view of this that we need to partner professional bodies on training States PACs,” he said.

    While noting that the House is committed to good governance, Chinda disclosed that a European parliament would be visiting the Committee next week to further collaborations on transparency in government.

    Leader of delegation, John Matheson, President of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accounting, UK commended government efforts at eliminating corruption

    Emmanuel Samuel of Periscope Consulting Ltd said: “Fighting corruption with robust finance management is now more expedient but there must be a good reporting structure in the MDAs”.

     

  • Corruption: Reps partner UK, Nigerian accounting firm

    The House of Representatives has reiterated it’s readiness to curb wastages
    and other forms of corruption in the utilization and application of public
    funds.
    Chairman, Public Accounts (PAC) Kingsley Chinda said his Committee is
    partnering Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy -UK and
    Periscope Consulting Limited, it’s Nigerian public financial management
    firm.
    Chinda, while receiving the delegation at the National Assembly on Thursday, regretted that the country is faced with challenges of corruption, weak structures and transparency.
    However, he stressed that the government is determined to put in sustained structures that can not be washed away too soon.
    “That is the reason we try to make utilization of public funds a public
    document through regular engagement of the Auditor General of the
    Federation at our meetings.
    “Together with Senate PAC, we looking at how to strengthen all State PACs
    so that we can be on same page.
    “It is in view of this that we need to partner professional bodies on
    training States PACs,” he said.
    While noting that the House is committed to good governance, Chinda
    disclosed that an European parliament would be visiting the Committee next
    week to further collaborations on transparency in government.
    Leader of delegation, John Matheson, President of the Chartered Institute
    of Public Finance & Accounting, UK commended Nigerian government efforts at eliminating corruption in the country.
    According to Matheson, curbing of corruption in accounting reporting which has been the focus of his Instirutute in its 30 years of existence is in tune with Nigerian government’s efforts against corruption.
    “We are in Nigeria to seek partnership for that purpose. We are very impressed with what is going on in the country because the
    journey appears very committed to reduce corruption at federal level and
    improving efficiency at State level,” he added.
    A member of the delegation, Emmanuel Bola Samuel of Periscope Consulting
    Ltd regretted that skill gap in finance administration in Ministries,
    Departments and Agemcies (MDA) is regrettable.
    He said: “What is we don’t seem to realise is that accounting has
    tranformed from collation of figures to reporting which makes
    accountability very critical.
    “Fighting corruption with robust finance management is now more expedient
    but there must be a good reporting structure in the MDAs.”
    Periscope’s Chief, Martins Olajide said the delegation was also at the
    Office of the Accountant-General for the Federation (OAGF) ad well as the
    Office of the Auditor-General for the Federation (OAGF).

  • Political culture, corruption and history

    CULTURAL Relativism in different political climes and systems arrest our attention on this page today and the reason is not far fetched. The US Presidential campaigns and elections of November 8 have gripped the attention of the civilized world, especially in the way in which a revived form of sexism and feminism is affecting the chances of the two candidate, who incidentally and for the first time, are not of the male sex.

    This, at least this week, happened at a time when history was being made in Nigeria with the rule of law facing an acid test with the unprecedented arrest of some judges overnight last week end by the DSS – the Department of State Security – which claimed to have found millions of both local and foreign currencies in the custody and residences of the affected judges. Similarly in Russia, which has been accused of trying to influence the results of the US presidential elections, Russia’s strongman, President Vladmir Putin, ignored the Americans as he did in taking a base in Syria and was busy trying to create a myth about the exploits of Russian warriors in the World War 2 similar to that of King Leonidas of Sparta and the 300 Spartans at the Pass of Thermoplae in ancient Greek Mythology.

     The last part of this quartet of Cultural Relativism comes from France and though romantic showed clearly the difference between US and French culture and politics. It was the publication of the love letters that former French Socialist President of France from 1981 – 1995, Francois Mitterand wrote to his Mistress. A publication which was said to be a master piece of literature and has endeared the late president albeit post humously, to his countrymen in his native France. Certainly, the tone and the venom of the US presidential campaign have been unprecedented in US history.

    In retrospect, that may be because a woman is about to become the first US president in history. But that alone cannot be responsible for the way a loose comment on women and sex by the male presidential candidate Donald Trump has turned him into a political leper within and without his party over the last one week. It dominated the second debate and occupied the global media. With normally composed and brilliant, famous, newscasters baring their fangs literally to force those who differ from them, to agree that the Republican candidate is not fit to live let alone contest for the US presidency.

    Yet his opponent, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has in my view a more serious malady or albatross to explain. Her luggage in this regard include the charge that she victimized women affronted by her husband Bill while being both Governor in Arkansas and President in the White House. It is pertinent to mention an exchange between a reporter against Donald Trump who said his locker talk would ruin the lives of young boys who watched the video.

    Quite unabashedly the woman being interviewed exploded that the American Culture was at play and Trump was not contesting to be Pope. She then finished off with the statement that when Bill Clinton committed his faux pas with Monica Lewinsky during his presidency her children growing up then were wondering if the White House had an Oval Office or an Oral Office. In addition it would seem the US establishment of both parties are sworn to sweep underground the issue of the destroyed 30000 phone data reportedly destroyed by Hillary and for which she has apologized and her apology seemingly accepted.

    Yet the security implications of that are infinitely more grievous than Trump’s lewd remarks for which he apologized in the second debate obviously to no avail. It is certainly in the US alone in this world that a remark or joke intended to be private and offhand can be reproduced a decade later to show that the person involved is still in that state of mind and psychological disposition. Former Republican candidate Dr. Ben Carson a renowned Neuro Surgeon tried to show his interviewer on CNN that when Trump made the lewd statements he was a play boy billionaire but now he is a presidential candidate.

    But the interviewer on CNN simply got livid with rage on her face trying take Trump to the cleaners on the way he spoke or fondled women. Dr Carson’s plea that the campaign and debate should move on to serious issues which divide both parties and nations wildly down the line, was ignored by an interviewer who till that interview was famous for her charming disposition and easy manners as a presenter and objective analyst of issues. It was really as if feminism or sexism had taken the front seat in this US presidential election and that to me is a great diversion which can backfire in making Hillary Clinton achieve her ambition of becoming the first female president of the US.

    With regard to the Nigerian political system, the issue of the arrest of judges goes back to the state and nature of our political culture and history as well as our constitutionalism. Luckily the Minister of Information and Culture spoke clearly and concisely in response to the arrests, that the law has not been breached in any way and that the government believes that nobody in Nigeria should be above the law. I certainly believe the Minster’s explanation for many reasons and our political evolution plays a part in that belief. This is because as a nation we started out on Parliamentary Democracy before the Military converted that to the Presidential System without regard for its inherent nature of being a tripod of separation of powers or cost of maintenance. Indeed as a nation we still operate a unitary system instead of a federal system. The unitary system is reflected in the funds allocation system whereby states go cap in hand to get funds lifeline from Aso Villa.

    It is reflected in the state of mind of the Nigerian legislature that it is an island on its own separated from the electorate that put it in power and that its leadership is above the law since it is the law making body as well as the budget approving authority. The unitary misconception must have led the arrested judges to believe that no security apparatus can secure a search warrant on them without invoking the wrath of the powerful NBA and the strong army of SANs who practise with them in their law courts where their word is law. Now of course they know that while funds and budgets may flow from the center in Aso Rock to the legislature and the judiciary as well as the states, justice, accountability and monitoring of fraudulent lifestyles can equally emanate from the same source, with equal vigor .

    The immediate lesson here is that the law is not an ass in present day Nigeria and that even though the mills of justice may grind slowly they grind exceedingly fine. Again one can look at the Mitterand love letters in France and the revival of the glory of the Soviet Army in the last World War by Putin in Russia in the context of US presidential elections and the political culture of both nations. Firstly the Monica Lewinsky matter that marred the Bill Clinton presidency and is being used to harass Hillary’s bid for presidency would not have become an issue in France. Indeed when Mitterand died and was buried his mistress was at the funeral with his daughter both behind the legitimate wife and son. Similarly Donald Trump’s banters would never have become an election issue in France. Yet France played a great role in the emergence of the American nation at independence ages ago and gave the US the Statue of Liberty which adorns the Harbor in New York. Yet the Americans have glorified gay rights and marriages and made monogamy between same sex a way of life while the present French President has four children from a lady who was the presidential opponent of Nikola Sarkozy and the president is not married to her. Indeed the present French president was elected as president in spite of that. With regard to Russia the timing of the praising of Soviet military prowess in the last World War is pertinent.

    It is Putin’s way of showing further contempt for US diplomacy under Obama and the consolidation of his world view that Russia has replaced the former Soviet Union and is challenging the US as the sole world power. Already it has a base in Syria and is still hovering over Ukraine. So if Putin spends time watching films on past military glories of the Soviet Union it is to position Russia for a bigger role in world affairs, better than a nation whose leader regards gay rights as his major achievement and which elects its leaders based on how they treat women and make advances to them. Once again long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria.