‘Corruption represents a threat’…to the stability and security of societies undermining the institutions of democracy, ethical values and justice and jeopardizing sustainable development and the rule of law’-Preamble to the UN Convention on Corruption
Corruption has become a major problem for Nigeria since she gained independence. It has reached levels of gross and egregious theft for which no moral justification can be advance. Corruption has also played a major role in our election and in the impoverishment of our people and had separated the people from their rulers. Politically, corruption has undermined democracy and good governance. According to Wikipedia on Political Corruption, corruption in the legislative bodies reduces accountability and distort representation in policymaking; corruption in the judiciary compromises the rule of law; and corruption in public administration results in the unequal distribution of services.
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More generally, corruption erodes the institutional capacity of government as procedures are disregarded, resources are siphoned off, and public offices are bought and sold. Similarly, Theobald, in his book, ‘Corruption, Development and Underdevelopment, opined that at the extreme, unbridled corruption can lead to a state of fragility and destructive conflict, and plunge a state into ‘unremitting cycle of institutional anarchy and violence’.
As a result of the negative effects of corruption on development, security and peace in the land corruption campaign in the country are not only cosmetics but failed to address the fundamental problems of corruption in Nigeria.
In Nigeria, ethnicity has also played an important role in corruption. It is part of what some analysts and writers branded as ‘prebendal politics’ and ‘clientelism’. In this country, to get political support, members of the political elites rewards his or her home people for self-preservation. The Nigeria politics has been tribalized to serve the interest of the political elites. There is no doubt that the miasma of corruption has left Nigeria prostrate. Although, the Tinubu administration is the focus currently but Nigerians know that the orgy of corruption pervades all administrations in Nigeria from independence.
It should be noted that the issue of corruption is not limited to the Abuja alone because all the 36 states of the Federation have had their resources and capacities massively assaulted by corrupt tendencies of elected representatives in the last and current dispensations. In most states, no effort is being made to probe past leaders and, in few places, where such initiatives are ongoing, they are largely encumbered by politics and what ‘corrupt leaders’ on trial and opposition politicians call ‘political witch-hunting’. At the local government level, in fact there is complete absence of any effort to probe past chairmen or any enthronement of anti-corruption initiative.
The issue now is that can corruption be completely curtailed/ Can we truly and permanently eliminate corruption from our national psyche by punishing those who have looted our commonwealth/. According to Anyiam Osigwe, it is important for us to understand the meaning of corruption if we must be able to generate the requisite approach to eliminating corruption from the public psyche. To him, ‘corruption is not just about the embezzlement of public funds. It is the perversion of the human psyche.
Corruption is an occurrence that perverts the human essence. It negates the human essence and ‘to free the society of corruption requires an institutional approach in which the composing individuals of the society have to be re-humanized. Therefore, he opined that ‘for corruption to be eliminated, there is need for total reorientation of every individual in the social order for the purpose of imbuing them with the requisite mindset which conveys the nobility of character etched in the value-laden conduct and propriety as a way of life’.
