By ‘Sola Fagorusi
Two years ago, a particular news created sensation in Nigeria, it was the revelation that the country, particularly through the Federal Civil Service had lost over $400 billion to corruption between 1966 and 1999. While this figure gives us an idea of how bad the problem of bribery and corruption in Nigeria is, it excludes the amount lost in the 36 states through similar actions. One year after this revelation, we were hit by another following the Illicit Financial Flows from Developing Countries: 2003-2012 report which discovered that a total of $7.92 billion in illicit capital flowed out of the country in 2012. Nigeria was ranked amongst the top 20 countries for illicit financial outflow. Nigeria’s present financial state is a manifestation of several of these cases of bribery and corruption. Chances are that if it continues unchecked we will be in dire national financial state in a couple of years from now.
Bribery is an offence in most countries. It involves giving money or favour to someone to induce such person to act falsely thereby conferring illicit advantage on the person giving the bribe or his/her affiliate(s). Bribery is one of the principal activities involved in corruption. And Nigeria is not in short supply of laws to suppress corruption. Nigeria has the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) Act, there is also the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC) Act, the Criminal and Penal codes and several others with intent ensure corruption in the country is brought to the final bow. The Code of Conduct Bureau and Tribunal Act is also an attempt to stem corruption with a mission to establish higher standards of morality in the conduct of government activities.
New media technology brings a new dimension to this quest to address bribery and corruption. And it makes it easier for citizens to assume the role of a whistle blower. One of such interventions is the Bribe Code. Available on www.bribecode.org, it subscribes to the idea that bribery is criminal. This is in perfect harmony with the Black Law’s Dictionary of bribery which also describes it as the offering, giving, receiving, or soliciting of any item of value to influence the actions of an official or other person in charge of a public or legal duty. The platform recognises that bribery is also prevalent in interactions between private firms and public institution. While public officials involved in bribery are easier to bring to the books, it is tough when corporate organisations are involved. Bribecode is ultimately a draft bill for the Corporate Corruption Act. It seeks that any company found guilty of giving or taking a bribe up to N1 million may be liquidated with no fine option. Where such is a public company with ownership involving shareholders not involved in management, the employment of the board of directors may be terminated, while the main, controlling shareholders lose their investments. It is a campaign to make our private institutions stand tall amongst other global ones and also sanitise the country’s business space.
The proposal also seeks to reward whistle-blowers by giving them 1% of the company’s forfeited asset. There is equally a mention of protection of the whistle blower in all of this. The Bribecode’s goal also includes to make recall of elected legislators found involved in any act of bribery and corruption possible through the provisions of the Section 69(a) of the constitution. The present call to action on this available online is for Nigerians to identify with the campaign and support it as the best way to release the stranglehold that corruption has on the future of Nigeria while also agreeing through the same mechanism that it should be passed into law.
It is an apt reminder of the UK bribery Act that came into force in 2011 though it was passed in 2010. The Act covers four chief misdemeanours – bribing a foreign public official, requesting or receiving a bribe, offering or paying a bribe and a corporate offence of failing to prevent bribery being undertaken on its behalf. The penalties for committing a crime under the Act are a maximum of 10 years imprisonment, along with an unlimited fine and the potential for the confiscation of property under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, as well as the disqualification of directors. The Serious Fraud Office of the United Kingdom matches the use of new media technology and the traditional means of reportage together. It creates a secure online reporting form for any individual willing to report bribery act and also leaves an address that the public can write to when intending to blow the whistle on any act of bribery and corruption. The SFO after receiving a report of possible corruption gets its intelligence team to make an assessment and decide if the matter is best dealt with by them or passed to one of our law enforcement partners.
www.bribespot.com is a global platform with a decent model. According to the curators of the platform, ‘Bribespot is anonymous service for reporting and tracking bribes online’. It allows people to share their stories and explore interactive maps of their communities on the go – using the smartphone apps – and on the website. Ultimately, they believe that the more users contribute to Bribespot, the easier it will be to identify hotspots of corruption in any given city and devise effective measures of tackling petty bribery. Unlike bribecode.org, bribespot.com totally scrambles any impersonal information with submitted report to preserve the safety of contributors while also looking out for suspicious reportages.
On a general note, Nigerians will benefit if government institutions set out to arrest bribery acts and corruption partners with platforms like www.bribecode.org while also making available institutional online channels where reportages, videos and audios can be shared with them.
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‘Sola Fagorusi is a social entrepreneur and a prized freelance writer with a bias for youth and rural development. He started off as a youth staff with Action Health Incorporated in 2001. The Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife alumnus currently manages the programmes ofOneLife Initiative, Nigeria. ‘Sola is a DESPLAY Africa (Africa’s foremost and most consistent annual youth democracy academy) fellow and has been on its faculty since 2011. Keenly interested in governance and pan-Africanism, he volunteers as online editor of YouthHub Africa; a cyber-community for young Africans involved in social change. He believes in the efficacy of oratory and writing as tools to drive developmental engagements. As a freelance writer, he spares time to pen thoughts on contemporary societal issues and is a weekly columnist with Nigeria’s most read daily ? Punch Newspaper. His training and capacity cuts across democracy and governance, leadership, micro-enterprise, ICT4D, SRH, value chains, development communication and policy issues. He tweets @SolaFagro and blogs at www.kadunaboy.com
