The burden of corruption and Nigeria’s bipolarity - @Omojuwa Last November, Sunday PUNCH reported that Nigeria had lost N5tr to corruption from May 2010 up to November 2012 all under the President Goodluck Jonathan administration. The nation’s number one news organisation relayed a detailed chronology of events and incidents that left the people of Nigeria short by an amount that exceeds all the budgetary allocations of the country when taken per year. We have never had a N5tr budget. The cost of corruption for this period does not include the budgetary allocations to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission as they have failed to prove their necessity since the end of the Chief Olusegun Obasanjo administration. The biggest corruption news under the Jonathan administration has been the state pardon granted to the UK law fugitive, Diepriye Alamieyeseigha. Obasanjo was accused of a lopsided fight against corruption; he was never accused of not fighting it. President Jonathan has been more accused of breeding corruption than he has been accused of an indifferent stance to the scourge. That is not to say this is the only reason there are as many poor Nigerians today as there were Nigerians in 1998 – 112 million. Many choose one reality and accuse same of being the reason Nigeria suffers from its many unwholesome realities. Some are quick to say we should divide the country into Lilliputian sizes and they are so certain that would solve all our problems. I was in Anambra State last month. A man walked up to me to complain about one of my team members for a road show I had with the Heinrich Boell Green Deal Nigeria project. He was so angry at this my team member and I realised I had to plead with him. I told him to calm down that the person in question was even his “brother”. That he was also from Anambra too. The angry young man from Anambra South said, “I am sure he is from Anambra North. They are wicked people.” I was taken aback by the obvious hatred the man had for people from his own state. When my team member came around, I had to ask him what part of Anambra he was from because I sensed I was going to find a story in there somewhere. It turned out my “wicked” team member was also from Anambra South. He was from the same place as the man who blamed his wickedness on where he came from. You will find stories like this even between border villages and towns. If we divide Nigeria based on tensions like this, we’d be divided into at least 1,548 states! These states will then go on to be divided further until we have a state to each man. We could start by treating issues that have scientific solutions instead of focusing on our differences. Corruption and the failures of our growing economy, (what a paradox?) are two issues we could deal with to advance our people’s lives. Corruption is a global citizen but while it is a persona non grata in most countries, it is a citizen with reserved privileges in Nigeria. Corruption in Nigeria has got the ears of the President, dines and wines with the First Ladies across the states, meets with the state governors and has got more national honours than piety. Corruption thrives in Nigeria because it is more rewarding to be corrupt here than to be clean. People have lost their jobs for not being corrupt. Corruption thrives because most people erroneously believe their turn will come. This is statistically impossible in a nation of about 160 million people. We will all be gone within 100 years and so not enough time for all of us to milk the nation. The milk would be enough for us all if we started with citizens’ fight against corruption. There was an impressive article last week on the Who is who of corruption in Nigeria. It will be great to have a book like that where a detailed report of these rogues will be published. Technology is also a useful tool to curb this menace. The Anti-Corruption Internet Database project by WANGONeT is a world class, multifunctional web repository for all corruption related issues in Nigeria. It is designed to bring to the public space a collaborative and structured presentation of information from the activities embarked upon by CSOs, media agencies and organisations engaged in anti-corruption and good governance projects and to provide veritable tools to facilitate civic engagement and public advocacy. The site, antigraft.org, will prove really useful as a DIY tool for citizens to get involved in the fight against corruption. This is the best literal definition of our destiny being in our hands and what we do with it now depends on what we do with these tools. A major aspect of the Nigerian bipolarity would have to be its right-growing GDP and its wrong-growing poverty rate. Despite a decade of economic growth, Nigeria’s poverty rate ranks amongst the highest in the world. The National Bureau of Statistics put the figures at 70 per cent in January 2012. What can we do about these disparities? First, we must understand that the growth numbers come off our sales of petroleum. Nigeria’s mono-cultural economy has meant that nearly 100 per cent of its foreign exchange earnings come from oil sales. Oil can grow the economy but it cannot take the populace out of poverty because it contributes only 14 per cent of GDP. Agriculture on the other hand contributes about 40 per cent of GDP while the services sector contributes 30 per cent. What this means is that the agriculture and services sectors are able to impact more on the lives of Nigerians if expanded than the petroleum sector. There are no silver bullets for development but there are necessities. Infrastructure is a necessity. It is the foundation for development. It is also important for a nation to develop transparent and efficient budget processes. The 2013 budget has been enmeshed in more secrecy than transparency. This is 2013 not 1013! The GDP remains a crucial economic indicator but the best indicator remains jobs. If you create jobs, the GDP will take care of itself. It remains to be seen what we do with power. The biggest enemy against power working in Nigeria is diesel. If power works, diesel sales will plunge. The President is friends with the country’s biggest diesel magnate. The President claims he is desperate for power to work, one wonders if the diesel magnate shares the same desperation. One can be openly desperate about one thing in public and acts out a different kind of desperation privately. Aren’t most politicians descendants of Janus? What must Nigeria do to move forward? We need to separate national foolishness from national seriousness. Pretending that growing GDPs matter in a jobless economy is a sign of national foolishness. Pretending that we are fighting corruption when the makers of the law are its chief breakers is a sign of acute national foolishness. If we must fix our country, we must begin by accepting that corruption is a shame we must deal with without prejudice. Then, we must fix ourselves. It won’t be so simple. •Japheth-Omojuwa, a social media entrepreneur and Editor AfricanLiberty.org, CREDIT: PUNCH NEWS
Posted on: Wed, 26 Jun 2013 10:40:23 +0000