By Amina Ahmed Yahaya
There is a direct connection between public apathy and the audacity of leaders to steal with impunity. Our Seeming lack of interest in how the billions of the repatriated Abacha loot were managed and spent largely encourages public office holders to get away with their indifference to transparency. Transparency in the management and expenditure of recovered looted funds is no less important than fighting corruption.
It is very sad that most Nigerians are indifferent to accountability issues. Such apathy undermines our collective interests.
The typical Nigerian would tell you that he does not want to waste his time complaining about lack of transparency because of the common belief that nothing will happen, and that our criticisms won’t deter public office holders from stealing.
How can we build a critical mass to resist corruption and uproot it in our society if we continue to believe that our voices mean nothing? Are we helping ourselves by being permanently indifferent to issues that significantly impact on our welfare? Is it enough to read about loot recoveries by the government, and then show utter indifference to the management of the recovered funds?
No democratic system would succeed when the citizens are indifferent to transparency and accountability issues. In fact, you cannot expect your welfare to be better when you choose to be uninterested in accountability.
One must, however, acknowledge the efforts of the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP), which has taken remarkable interest in the management of the recovered Abacha loot. Speaking at a recent press conference in Lagos, the NGO called on President Muhammadu Buhari to “thoroughly investigate the role and involvement of the World Bank in the repatriation, management and spending of Abacha stolen funds and other funds.”
According to SERAP, the investigation would ensure full transparency and accountability in these transactions. The NGO also wants to know the projects on which the funds were spent. In its report entitled: “Deterring Kleptomaniacs: Finding Nigeria’s Re-stolen Billions and Repatriated Looted Funds, SERAP emphasized the urgency of seeking answers to questions surrounding the expenditure of the recovered Abacha loot.
It would be naïve, however, to think that SERAP alone can do the job if other Nigerians are indifferent to the issue of transparency in the expenditure of the Abacha loot. Nigerians have legitimate right to know the projects on which these billions of recovered funds were spent.
What is the point in recovering looted funds, and the monies end up being re-looted or unaccounted for? How can loot recovery efforts sustain their credibility when the citizens are left in the dark about the expenditure of these recovered billions?
How would European and American governments take our leaders seriously when recovered looted funds cannot be duly and convincingly accounted for?
It is not enough to organize press conferences to announce the recovery of the Abacha loot and end the story there. Informing Nigerians of how these recovered funds were applied to the improvement of their welfare is no less important. It worries me why Nigerians are not keen to ask questions pertaining to the management and expenditure of the recovered Abacha loot.
No less important, Nigerians should not be fooled into believing that corruption started and ended with the death of Abacha. Since Abacha’s demise, corruption has been growing apace in Nigeria, which exposed the insincerity and hypocrisy of anti-corruption crusade of the former Obasanjo administration.
Nigerians should be keen to ask why loot recovery efforts seem almost exclusively concentrated on the Abachas. Does it mean the Obasanjo administration could not find looted funds stolen by other corrupt Nigerians, including members of his own administration? According to the Washington-based Transparency Integrity Group, from 1999 to 2010, and estimated 269 billion dollars were fraudulently transferred out of Nigerian into private banks accounts abroad.
This figure is colossal by any standard. Was Abacha in government when these funds were stolen? Why did the Obasanjo administration focus its loot recovery efforts on the Abachas? Does it mean the billions stolen by other corrupt officials were not important in improving social services?
Corruption by General Abacha or anybody else is indefensible. However, it is insulting to the intelligence of Nigerians that to create the impression that the Abacha loot was the only money available for recovery. Nigerians are sick and tired of being inundated with stories of the Abacha loot when they cannot see real efforts in tracing and recovering other looted funds. Worse still, nobody can account for how these billions were spent.
Miss Yahaya, a social worker, wrote from No. 87 Emeka Anyaoku Street, Area 11, Garki, Abuja. Email: [email protected]
