Follow Us on Google
The Catholic Bishop of Sokoto Diocese, Mathew Hassan Kukah, recently noted that corruption was rife during the eight-year reign of ex-President Muhammadu Buhari. He said though corruption did not start with Buhari’s administration, it blossomed under his watch as Nigerians witnessed “the ugliest phase of corruption, whether in moral terms, financial terms and other terms.”
The revered cleric is known for his candour and fearlessness. In his April 2022 Easter message, for instance, he berated the immediate past President for the high spate of insecurity, corruption and division along ethnic lines in Nigeria. He said under Buhari, almost every aspect of life, including our educational system, economy, energy system, security, infrastructure, family dreams, politics, children’s lives and future were broken. Only corruption, he regretted, was alive and well.
Kukah’s position on corruption under Buhari is unassailable. In the 2022 Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index (CPI), for instance, Nigeria ranked 150 out of 180 countries assessed. Although the country moved up four steps in the 2022 index as against the 154 it was ranked in 2021, the score did not change. It remains 24 out 100 points, the same score in 2021. This happens to be the country’s lowest score since 2012.
A number of factors inform Nigeria’s frequent low score in the CPI. Let’s take the subsidy regime under Buhari for example. Trillions of naira went down the drain in the name of subsidy payment. Yet, the relevant authorities prevaricated on the amount of fuel consumed daily in Nigeria and the cost implications. While the House of Representatives estimated that Nigeria consumed between 40 and 45 million litres daily, the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) reportedly used between 65 and 100 million litres per day to determine subsidy charges. Oil theft was also rife. About 437,000 barrels of oil a day worth about $10billion were reportedly stolen between January and July 2022. This theft was done with impunity as the culprits were said to have very powerful links with the people in power.
Corruption in ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) of government did not abate under Buhari. In 2018, for instance, it was reported that a mystery snake “swallowed” about N36 million cash kept in the accounts office of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) in Makurdi, the Benue State capital. These MDAs were also in the habit of padding budgets with impunity. According to the Independent Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), the MDAs padded the 2021 budget to the tune of N300billion. They also padded the 2022 budget to the tune of N100billion. Besides, the suspended Accountant-General of the Federation, Idris Ahmed, was alleged to have stolen N109 billion. He has only been able to refund N30billion out of the lot. In Buhari’s government, corruption trailed the sharing of our COVID-19 palliatives in 2020. The Public Procurement Act was often violated with the inflation of contract sums. Misuse of security votes was rampant. Nepotism in major political appointments was the order of the day. The volume of illicit financial flows from Nigeria under Buhari also exposed the level of corruption in that administration. In the first quarter of 2020, for instance, the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU) flagged suspicious transactions worth over N150 trillion.
Implementation of the rule of law was also selective. In most cases, no matter how corrupt a politician was, once he joined the ruling party, his sins would be forgiven. These corrupt politicians deployed huge amounts of dollars and naira to sway voters, compromise the system and buy their way to victory. This was particularly glaring during the last primary elections of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and the main opposition party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Some election petitions are currently in the tribunals; but the judiciary is not trusted to dispense justice due to corruption.
Buhari could not also stop corruption at the nation’s international airports as some security agents extorted money from many travellers. On many Nigerian roads, the police and Customs officers continued to indulge in extortion of motorists. In 2020, these extortions and extra-judicial killings by policemen triggered massive protests tagged #EndSARS against the defunct Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) of the police.
The anti-graft agencies may have recorded some gains in terms of prosecution and convictions of some corrupt individuals as well as recovery of looted assets. But, there were question marks over the management of confiscated assets and pardon granted some convicts. Last year, Buhari pardoned former governors of Plateau and Taraba States, Joshua Dariye and Jolly Nyame, found guilty of corruption after a few years in jail. The Bola Tinubu administration should learn from Buhari’s mistakes and prioritise the fight against corruption by tackling the problem head-on. It should strengthen our institutions, especially the anti-graft agencies, to be able to tackle the monster effectively. The judiciary must also be strengthened to deal with corruption cases quickly and dispassionately. It’s time to put a stop to the pretences about the fight against corruption.
