Two days ago, Lai
Mohammed, minister of information, dismissed Transparency International’s (TI)
latest corruption perception index which ranked Nigeria low on corruption but
what was his response to the poor rating of the country eight years ago?
In the latest TI
rating Nigeria ranked 146 of 180 countries, with a total of 26 points out of a
possible 100 points. Responding to the poor rating, Mohammed told TI that the
federal government is not seeking to impress any organisation with its
anti-corruption fight.
“…we are not
fighting corruption because we want to impress any organisation. We are
fighting corruption because we believe that without fighting the menace, the
much-sought development will not happen and we have results to show for
fighting corruption,” he had said in London.
In 2012 when
ex-President Goodluck Jonathan was in power, Mohammed, who was the spokesman of
the The Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), a major part of the bloc that later
metamorphosed into the All Progressives Congress (APC), had described the
Nigeria’s low ranking on TI index as a proof that Jonathan “is not serious”
about fighting corruption.
It was less than two
years into that administration and Nigeria was ranked 35th most corrupt country
in the world.
In a strongly-worded
statement at the time, Mohammed said the “harvest of corruption scandals’’
under the Jonathan administration was unprecedented in Nigeria’s history, and
has been attested to by TI.
He had said:
“According to the latest CPI, Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation and one of
the continent’s biggest economies was not listed among the top 35 least corrupt
nations in Africa, even when it was ranked the 35th most corrupt nations in the
world.
“It is also
instructive that Liberia and Sierra Leone, which Nigeria helped to liberate
from the throes of war are now doing much better in fighting corruption than
the country (Nigeria), just like much smaller and less-endowed nations like
Niger, Gambia, Burkina Faso and Mali are better rated.
“In all of these and
more, the administration has shown an amazing lack of political will in
investigating the scams and prosecuting perpetrators. “Worst still, key
administrative officials have shown from their careless comments that they
either do not understand what it means to fight corruption or they are just
trivialising it.
“President Jonathan
must wake from his slumber and face the reality that corruption is fast eating
deep into the soul of Nigeria, having already decimated the body. He must stop
playing the ostrich and lead the way in the fight against corruption before it
consumes the country.”
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