Eliminating corruption through inequality reduction

 

Nigeria since return of democracy in 1999 have, at least, made pronouncements about ending corruption and also took actions to this regard. The Obasanjo administration, for example, set up the Independent Corrupt Practices and Related Offences Commission and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission to investigate reports of corruption and to investigate financial crimes respectively. Other administrations that followed cued into the idea of fighting corruption and thus these agencies have operated for quite some time now. The key question that follows is whether the agencies and the police have done enough to significantly reduce corruption and financial crimes in Nigeria.

Inequality is not limited to the unfair situation in a society when some sections or some members of the society have more opportunities than the others or are treated differently from the others. Its scope also covers the scenario whereby the funds meant for development purposes are stolen by some individuals in positions of authority thereby denying the average citizens what is due them. Nigeria runs a presidential system of government whereby the states and local governments also function alongside the Federal Government. It is also a fact that payment of staff salaries gulps a good percentage of government resources such that recurrent expenditure more than surpasses capital expenditure and that capital expenditure in the last 10 years have not exceeded 45 per cent of the overall federal annual budget.

It is pitiful that the country borrows to pay salaries when borrowing should ideally be for projects that are related to human capital development or for investment in infrastructure. What is more pitiful however is the fact that public funds, part of which are borrowed funds to finance budget deficit, are still being misappropriated. What do I mean?

Following the report of the uncovered N118bn salaries paid to 46,639 “ghost workers” in 2014 by the implementation of the Integrated Payment Personal Information System in 215 Ministries Departments and Agencies, more recent cases have been uncovered. It was reported in May 2017 that Sokoto State alone expunged 13,415 “ghost workers” from their payroll; Benue State was in June 2017 reported to have begun investigation into who were behind the 2,500 “ghost workers” on its payroll; Enugu State was reported just last month to have removed over 6,200 “ghost workers” from its payroll. At the federal level, the Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, was reported in October 2016 to have announced that the Ministry of Finance had uncovered 33,000 “ghost workers” from the Federal Government payroll and as a result was saving N23bn monthly. And in July 2017, Vice President Yemi Osibanjo while speaking at the 5th Annual Christopher Kolade Lecture in Lagos was reported to have put the number of the uncovered “ghost workers” at the federal level to be 60,000.

The question is: Has anyone been thrown behind bars or given other appropriate punishments for these crimes since we have been seeing and hearing all these cases of fraud reported in the media? A good place to start, in my opinion, is to investigate the finance officers who signed off on those payments for complicity; and during the course of the investigations the persons involved will start to surface. For this “sanitisation” process to yield results, strong political will to actually fight corruption is needed from the government both at the federal and state levels to bring this ill-practice to a deserved end. If the funds meant for governance are diverted to individuals without people being brought to book, then there is no better definition of “promotion of socio-economic inequality” that one can ever find. Public funds should be made to work for the people; be used to build infrastructure, social amenities and for investment in human capital like the provision of quality health care services and education. And if it cannot be so, I wonder what the role of government is.

 

Fidelis Toochukwu Onyejegbu,

Centre for Social Justice, Abuja

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