The art and culture of living above one's income

Corruption has since turned into an art following the sophistication of anti-graft protocols by national governments and the global community. The reason for this development is not far fetched. It has been acknowledged globally that corruption is mostly responsible for the many cases of poor political leadership, pandemic poverty, snail-speed economic growth, decaying socio-economic infrastructure, and political instability especially in Sub-Saharan Africa.

It has also become an acceptable norm for people who occupy public offices to acquire fleet of expensive automobiles and own landed properties in major cities across the globe. Those who fail to meet this mark are hurriedly dismissed as dull or out of tone with current realities. This is most regrettable.

A careful analysis of this sad development has shown that people are forced into living above their incomes for varying reasons. Chief among them are weak national socio-economic framework which is too feeble to support citizens survive on their legitimate incomes. People are therefore forced to seek alternative means of finding funds to take care of their basic necessities such as shelter, food, clothing, health care, and educational needs of their families. This is one of the many ways corruption grow in developing societies.

There is no gainsaying that in addition to the high level of unemployment, close to 50% of Nigerian subsistent farmers, artisans, and junior workers in the public service earn barely $1 dollar daily. Another 30% earn about $2 daily while 20% earn close to $5 daily. The percentage of Nigerians that earn up to $100 daily is less than 10%. With such realities staring us in the face, one can rush to the conclusion that most Nigerians are living above their legitimate incomes going by the cost of imported cars, household equipments, and sprawling mansions springing up every minute of the day across the country.

Disturbed by the near boiling-point anger of the masses, the political class has now devised some strange mechanisms to launder proceeds of corruption. These are in the form of outrageous allowances, over invoicing of contracts, frivolous travels and seminars among others.

As part of efforts to discourage people from living above their legitimate incomes, government must act fast and address the following issues:
1. Reduce to the barest minimum, the percentage of unemployment and poverty
2. Carry out Socio-cultural re-orientation
3. Redesign the nation’s anti-graft protocols

In order to achieve these three fundamental objectives, government will need to energise the organized private sector to stimulate rapid national economic growth with specific emphasis on agriculture and other non-oil sectors of the economy. This will not only expand the employment market but also help to reduce poverty significantly. With this development, crime rate will fall drastically.

Furthermore, government will have to embark on the revitalization of all national socio-economic infrastructures like roads and power in order to reduce the high cost of doing business. Government should also pursue the inland waterways and railway transport infrastructure as part of efforts to reduce the high cost of moving goods and services around the country. Insecurity is another problem threatening the nation’s economic growth. The various security agencies should collaborate and invest massively in intelligence gathering mechanism. More than that, government should strengthen existing specialized banks like Bank of Industry and National Agriculture and Cooperative Bank to provide cheaper access to funds for farmers and those that desire to establish new businesses. The commercial banks are usually not ideal for these kinds of enterprises.

The National Orientation Agencies to me have not been doing enough to service its mandate. The agency should liaise with religious, social, and community based organisations to re-orient citizens on the importance of hard work and integrity.

In addition to all the existing anti-graft legislations establishing and empowering both the EFCC and ICPC, there is still the important need to establish a National Wealth Verification Commission (NWVC). Whoever- citizen or foreigner that intends to spend N3m or more should be required by law to approach any recognized court of law to swear to an affidavit indicating the sources of the fund and lodge the original copy with the NWVC. Within a maximum of 24 hours, the deponent will be issued a clearance certificate with which to spend the said amount. However, the issuance of the Clearance Certificate must not be tied to confirmation of facts deposed to by the deponent. NWVC will however within a period of not more than 12 months carry out thorough investigation of sources of funds and issue a Certificate of Confirmation of the previous Clearance Certificate. Where the deponent is found to have sworn to a doubtful or false affidavit, such person will be prosecuted in a specialized court set up to try cases of financial corruption alone. It is my belief that the introduction of NWVC will go a very long way to reduce the menace of corruption in Nigeria.

Anti-graft war: when a nation's No.1 law officer becomes helpless

A new but sad vista was added to the myriad of reasons why not much have been achieved in Nigeria’s much talked-about war against graft despite the huge amount of human and material resources invested in it. As a matter of fact, it was tales of helplessness and absence of zeal that were brought to the fore when the immediate past Attorney-General of the federation and Minister of Justice, Mr. Mohammed Adoke volunteered answers during the screening exercise of ministerial nominees at the National Assembly in Abuja on Thursday, 30th June, 2011.
Clearly, his opinion about the EFCC and ICPC were not unexpected. Adoke was quite aware that of recent, the nation’s two anti-graft agencies have become very unpopular among members of the National Assembly. This is not unconnected with the bitter experiences of the former speaker of the House of Representatives; Mr. Dimeji Bankole and other principal officers. He therefore capitalized on this unique opportunity to play to the gallery without counting his teeth.

Without doubt, Adoke’s comments about EFCC and ICPC carried marks of occupational fatigue and ‘do as you wish’ attitude. All of these are dangerous and unexpected of the No. 1 law officer of a country that’s desirous of winning the battle against corruption. As Attorney-General of the federation and Minister of Justice, Adoke had both teeth and voice but for reasons best known to him alone; refused to bark simply because the fierce looking leadership of both the EFCC and ICPC hanged a charge of ‘interference’ on his neck. This is novel in the history of anti-graft crusade.

To many observers, it was shocking to hear that the EFCC and ICPC lacked the required capacity to do thorough investigation and collation of evidences to secure the conviction of persons charged with corrupt practices. This cannot be true. Perhaps, the former law officer was only trying to polish the fact that officials the nation’s two anti-graft agencies do collect gratification and deliberately leave openings to enable accused persons escape the long arm of the law.

There is already this cloudy opinion in some quarters that the fast becoming culture of rift between the office of the Attorney-General of the federation on one hand and those of EFCC and ICPC on the other are the handiwork of some well heeled apostles of corruption in and outside the country. It started in the early days of the late President Musa Yar’Adua’s administration. The then attorney-general, Mr. Michael Aondoakaa and the leadership of EFCC and ICPC never agreed to put their kernels in one basket. It therefore became extremely difficult for government to wage an effective war against corruption. Some analysts are of the opinion that these unnecessary disagreements are mere smokescreens rehearsed and deployed to distract and eventually deceive unsuspecting Nigerian masses.

Let no one, including Mohammed Adoke stand on the Vaswani brothers’ case to undress the EFCC and ICPC in front of Nigerian masses. The truth is that, right from 2000 when the ICPC was inaugurated; the office of the Attorney-General of the federation has never wanted to fight corruption. They have rather been busy rubbing drums of grease on the elbows of Nigeria’s many and powerful apostles of corruption. To support this opinion, let’s consider the submission of Adoke as it concerns the Halliburton scandal. According to him, “I decided to confront the issue once and for all. I called for the reports and went through the reports. I found out that there were no sufficient evidences linking any of our past leaders in respect of the said Halliburton scandal.

“Those of them that we could identify, including Halliburton itself, Julius Berger, and others, we decided to evaluate the position of our laws. At the end of the day, in line with global best practices, we opted to settle with them, because if we decided to prosecute them, the likeliness of our securing a conviction was very minimal.”

With due respect to Mohammed Adoke, his submission was not only shallow but an insult on the sensibilities of ordinary Nigerians. He should do well to tell Nigerians how weak our laws are that it cannot nail persons that clearly took bribes to influence the awards of contracts. This is made more repulsive because some of the foreigners that gave the bribes have been indicted in their countries. Even in the face of the worst case scenario, we should ascribe to Femi Falana’s opinion that the aim of going to court is not always to win. Sometimes, it should act as opportunities to make bold statements. In the Halliburton case, the statement would have been: corruption is killing our nation. The truth about the Halliburton case is that no one is disputing the fact that bribes were given. What, according to Adoke was the problem is lack of sufficient evidences to nail those involved. Even at that, the minutest of evidences should have been presented in court and allow the judge to make a pronouncement. This will add real value to the war against graft. Our anti-corruption war should also seek to place moral burdens on those that committed corrupt practices but were freed by the courts due to technical inadequacies. This will in some way help to discourage corrupt intentions.

We are aware that it has become fashionable for those accused of corrupt practices to abandon proving their innocence to pursuing technical loopholes to escape justice. Unfortunately, there is no practical evidence anywhere that any of Nigeria’s attorneys-general has religiously made attempts to tighten our laws so as not to give room for corrupt persons to shorten the long arms of the law. This is what I earlier on referred to as occupational fatigue. It’s sometimes caused by lack of patriotism. That’s the reason for question like, “na my papa work? It takes only a patriotic mind for a public office holder to go all the length for one’s country.

More than that, the majority of Nigerians are convinced about President Goodluck Jonathan’s promise of a national reformation agenda. The foundation of this conviction is in his decision to appoint a no-nonsense Nigerian in the person of Professor Attahiru Jega as head of INEC. Every informed mind is aware of the fact that the task of national transformation starts with the conduct of credible elections, which the Professor Jega-led INEC did. The president will need to do same for the office of the attorney-general and minister of justice if the war against graft must be won.

Furthermore, appropriate legislation should be made to streamline the activities of the EFCC and ICPC to make them more civil in terms of their mode of reporting, investigation, invitation, arrest, and prosecution. Also, the reasons behind the constant conflict between the offices of the attorney-general and the anti-graft agencies must also be addressed so as to avoid technical lapses that led to rewarding corrupt people with their ill-gotten wealth. Most importantly, thorough investigation must be concluded before the arrest of suspects. These investigations should be tired to time. No investigation should take more than twelve months.
While I agree with Adoke that the EFCC and ICPC were in some cases involved in snowmaking while doing their jobs, it will be very difficult to invite or arrest Politically Exposed Persons (PEP) without the media making noise about it. This is where the ‘show’ comes in. Is he suggesting that their invitation, arrest, and prosecution should be done in secrecy?

Dressing corruption in white linen

Never in the history of Nigeria has the fight against corruption been so fiercely fought like have been done in the last ten years. Despite this fact, only very little have been achieved by the two major anti-graft agencies- EFCC and ICPC. This is hugely due to the high amount of energy and craft deployed by the many apostles of corruption within and outside government. Unknown to many, corruption has almost become a national culture. Many Nigerians are also forced to see and take corruption as a source of livelihood. It is pertinent to point out that high level of unemployment has made the culture of corruption fashionable. There is therefore the important need for government to take the issue of unemployment very seriously.

To effectively tackle the problems of unemployment, government at all levels must do well to expand the economy by energizing the private sector to create many new jobs. This can be achieved through the deliberate reduction of the general cost of doing business, access to cheap business start-up capital with a friendly repayment plan, and the wooing of foreign investment among others.

There is no gainsaying that Nigeria has a robust market and variety of mineral resources that will easily attract foreign investors. Nevertheless, issues of stable power, security, effective transport infrastructure, and stable polity are critical factors in the global business community. It is recognized worldwide that only sound political leadership culture can promote a healthy business environment. This is what every investor- local or foreign look out for.

Unfortunately however, very sad realities in the nation’s polity have continued to pose a major threat to winning the confidence of foreign investors. Very few investors will be willing to risk their capital in a country where integrity and patriotism are relegated to the background of national culture. It is a very huge fact that the lack of integrity helps to blind public servants from seeing the evils of corruption. Also worthy of note is the fact that only unpatriotic leaders can afford to take undue advantage of their exalted offices to promote mainly their individual interests at the expense of the larger society choking in the cold hands of poverty.

No doubt, the business of law making is sacred. This is true to the extent that quality laws help put societies on the fast lane of socio-economic transformation. Ordinarily, legislators are treated with high level of regard in all democratic societies. This is however not so in Nigeria owing to very bitter incidents in the National Assembly in the last twelve years. Apart from the fact that many members snore through sittings, supposed honourable law makers have on several occasions engaged in physical assaults on each other right inside the hallowed chambers of the National Assembly. On one or more occasions, these contemptible incidents had resulted to injuries, hospitalization, and even death.

One of the greatest threats to Nigeria’s democracy is the several cases of corruption allegations against successive leaderships of the National Assembly since the nation returned to democratic political leadership in 1999. Allegations of corruption have always been the reason behind the frequent changes of leadership in both the lower and upper chambers of the National Assembly. This is most shameful and unacceptable in modern societies. It has no doubt rubbished our collective efforts as a nation aimed at winning the confidence and respect of members of the international community. Perhaps, this will help to explain why despite Nigeria’s huge market and variety of abundant natural resources, foreign investors have been reluctant to put their capital in the economy of the world’s most populous country of black people. This is a big indictment of past and present leaderships of the National Assembly. They have not been able to lay a solid foundation for an effective national transformation agenda.

Nigerians cannot continue to feign ignorance of the fact that our legislators have fallen short of global best practices. While in many countries, law makers are spurred by patriotic zeal to serve; Nigerian legislators seem to be ruled by their individual interests. That could be the only reason why they are not in any way bothered by the urgent need to legislate towards improving on power supply, transport infrastructure, health care, education, housing, security, employment, and national economic growth. Instead, they busy themselves with padding their individual pockets with outrageous allowances. This is nothing but dressing corruption with white linen. Their aim is to mislead Nigerians. A black cloth will remain a black cloth whether won to the farm, market, office, or funeral. In the same vein, corruption is corruption whether dressed with white linen called allowances.

Instead of the executive arm being a threat to our democracy, it is the legislature that Nigerians are worried about. The reason for this is not far fetched. Graft dressed in white linen has taken a whooping 25% of national budget. To make matters worse, the National Assembly have rubbished the necessity of the Revenue Mobilisation and Fiscal Allocation Committee (RMFAC) through its in-house mechanisms. The doctrine of checks and balance has been tilted in favour of the legislature. They have unlimited powers to decide what individual members take home as allowances. This could be the only reason why members of the National Assembly take home between N60m and N100m as allowances alone every quarter. They are also at liberty to borrow at will.

From the look of things, the task is too big for the executive arm of government alone. Nigerian masses will need to join forces with the executive to clip the overbearing wings of members of the National Assembly. The nation’s present economic realities do not support the outrageous salaries and allowances our legislators take home. It is therefore surprising that despite the revelation by the CBN governor, Mallam Sanusi Lamido that a whole of 25% of the nation’s budget was spent on the welfare of national law makers; efforts have never been made to correct the anomaly by the law makers themselves. The long suffering Nigerian masses had expected the law makers to show remorse and rush to “repentance” following the Sanusi “missile.”

As a nation, we do not need Prophet T.B. Joshua to prophesy that Nigerian masses are angry. If the leadership of the National Assembly is not prepared to begin the process of “unpadding” their pockets, those individual members with conscience should do the unusual by returning a minimum of 50% of their allowances to the federal treasury and earn the forgiveness of history. The “unpadded” funds should be added to the allocations of state governments. It will go a long way in helping to breach the gap that the N18,000 minimum wage law will cause many state governments.

"Witches" Boo EFCC Boss

It has now become fashionable for associates of persons suspected of corruption to accuse government of “witch-hunting”. The latest was the booing of the chairman of Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mrs. Farida Waziri by some members of the National Assembly. This is most shameful and should be condemned by all patriotic Nigerians. It will be safe for one to argue that there is really nothing wrong in hunting “witches”- corrupt persons. This is so because corruption has destroyed the foundation of good governance in the country.

There is no doubt about the fact that the widely reported story of the booing of the EFCC boss by some members of the National Assembly is very disturbing. The nation’s legislators should not squander the patience of the Nigerian masses. The masses have not yet recovered from the revelation by the CBN governor, Mallam Sanusi Lamido that a whooping 25% of the nation’s total budget was used to service the welfare of members of the National Assembly alone. Indirectly supporting corruption will therefore push the poor suffering masses to tow the path of self help which is too extreme and dangerous for our democracy.

Rather than accusing the anti-graft agency of witch-hunting opponents of government, the legislators should condemn whatever form of corrupt practices by their colleagues and go ahead to make public the names of those being shielded from prosecution. The time has past when associates of persons accused of corruption fueled narrow sentiments or simply hide behind the banner opposition to buy the sympathy of Nigerians. This is a new Nigeria.

Those who live in glass houses are not supposed to throw stones- misappropriate or steal public funds. This is one reality most public office holders have failed to accept. The long arm of the law will always be there to flog them despite any amount of booing.