Nigeria’s International Image under PMB: the Challenge of Anti-Corruption War and National Unity

By Bola A. Akinterinwa

The perception of Nigeria when she acceded to national sovereignty on October 1, 1960 was that a great nation was in the making. Nigeria’s capacity and policy position to challenge France’s atomic tests in  the Reggane area of the Sahara desert shortly before her independence lent much credence to a great Nigeria in the making. The perception became stronger and more interesting with Nigeria’s foreign policy of ‘no compromise with Apartheid South Africa’ in 1963.

Apart from the very dynamic afro-centric foreign policy, entrepreneurial, industrial development plans were also put in place to the admiration of the western-dominated world. The world could not have been happier with the then pro-west foreign policy of Nigeria. In fact, the support for Nigeria was to the extent that the United States not only gave active support to the establishment of the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs but also donated books for its take-off.

 However, the image of Nigeria at the domestic level was not much of a big deal: national unity was first threatened in 1962 as Kirk Green’s documents on crisis and conflicts in Nigeria have clearly shown. National unity was actually confronted with the outbreak of a civil war in 1967. The battle came to an end in 1970 but there is nothing to suggest that the war of national unity had been won since then. What specially helped Nigeria’s image domestically and internationally was General Yakubu Gowon’s policy of’ ‘no victor and no vanquished,’ as well as the prompt introduction of the policy of reconciliation, rehabilitation and reconstruction.

Nigeria’s pro-African foreign policy continued in the post-civil war era and not only endeared the country to the world but was also to the detest of some others who were actually aiding and abetting apartheid and under-development of Africa. In fact, when General Muhammadu Buhari was military Head of State of Nigeria, Nigeria’s international image was fraught with both encouragement and suspicion. It was encouragement at the level of his policy on war against indiscipline and suspicion at the level of policy of trade by barter which he adopted to guide his foreign economic relations.

 As elected leader of Nigeria, President Muhammadu Buhari (PMB) is not only encouraged by many people for carrying the anti-graft war to the door steps of the elite, but is also being suspected for alleged politicisation of the war. His mania and approach to the war on corruption is under severe criticism. As a result, the international image of Nigeria is gradually becoming an issue: is PMB truly serious about his anti-graft war? Is his war strategy an appropriate one? What is the extent to which the war can succeed? In the event of a new administration, can the war effort be sustained?

Vie Internationale believes that ‘perception’ is an important factor in the evaluation of bilateral ties, attitudinal disposition of states, and particularly in decision-making. In determining what future the anti-graft may have, the factor of perception must be looked into. This is in spite of whether or not the perception is right. Consequently, as  the global community is much interested in fighting corruption tooth and nail the world over, impression must not be given that there is no seriousness of purpose in the efforts being made by the PMB administration. The seriousness must be reflected in all ramifications, especially in principles and actions, fairness and justice.

The argument of this column  is that PMB is serious about the anti-graft war but the likelihood of his success is, at best, debatable for three main reasons: approach; insincerity and unfairness in the political governance of Nigeria; and acquiescence or conspiratorial attitude of the people of Nigeria. These reasons are actually the main dynamics of corruption and indiscipline since corruption was first identified as the bane of the Nigerian society in 1967 by Professor J.S. Cookey.

Major Dynamics of Corruption in Nigeria

The approach to the anti-corruption war is in itself a major source of another corruption. Steve Nwosu, in his Frank Talk on ‘As anti-graft war runs into a hitch’ (The Sun, April 13, 2017, back page), raised some relevant interesting points but some of which we do not agree with. He contended that ‘the manner we were going about the fight against corruption in the country was wrong and unsustainable.’ We cannot agree more with this hypothesis, but not for the same reasons advanced by him.

 In the eyes of Steve, if the EFCC case against Governor Ayo Fayose of Ekiti State, which prompted the freezing of his bank account, but ‘unfreezed’ by a law court in due respect to his right to immunity as a serving governor; and if the cases of others like Chief Mike Ozekhome, Fayose’s lawyer; Dame Patience Jonathan, former First Lady of Nigeria; Justice Ademola and his wife; Andrew Yakubu, the former Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Cooperation (NNPC), etc, could be quashed in the law courts to the detriment of the interests of the prosecuting EFCC, then something must be wrong with the method and the allegations.

In this regard, Steve considered the empirical experience he had in the prosecution of two cases, not only to note that ‘there is so much hot air and no substance,’ but also that ‘in virtually all the instances where conviction was secured, arm-twisting,  intimidation and other extra-judicial means had a major role.’

 Perhaps more interestingly, but more disturbingly, Steve said ‘people whose means of livelihood was shut down ad infinitum were left with no choice than to cut their loss by pleading guilty to offences they probably never committed, or agreeing to some bogus plea bargain arrangement. Many who returned money did so, not because they had stolen it but because of extraneous reasons.’

This is where the point of disagreement lies: why should anyone accept to have stolen because of extraneous considerations? What is the nature of the ‘extraneous reasons’ that would be allowed to override the name and integrity of the concerned person in the long run? We do not share this argument because the existence of factors of arm-twisting, intimidation, and possibly extra-judicial means does not and should not imply that the truth should not be insisted upon in self-defence and for sake of posterity. Why accept to refund whatever money if it is legitimately earned? Why accept the compromise of free bargaining? Let us look at one of my own experiences.

 In 2014 and 2015, the General Ike Nwachukwu-led Governing Council of the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs made strenuous efforts to intimidate and arm-twist me to promote two research officers to the professorial cadre by dictating to me the contents of the letters to be sent to the assessors after I had already sent what I believed were the appropriate letters. The Council got the addresses of the assessors and mailed the letters directly to them. In fact, one of the Council members even had the indecent courage of personally but informally contacting one of the assessors.

When the Council requested for an update on the responses from the assessors at a meeting of Council, I responded that the Council was handling and that I was the one to ask for an update because professorship is not about the sale of commodity in the market. It is not an honorary title that can be commercialised. In fact, it is more serious than any military title which is always earned on merit. On this basis, I stood my ground and the Council took the bad end of the stick. The Council could not do more than distorting the truth and feeding the Supervisory Authority with untruths, especially that the dust over my handling of an international conference centre in which the Council has special interests could not settle down. I resisted intimidation and arm-twisting.

  But true enough, the Federal Government was very happy with this type of misinformation. Government was not interested in investigating allegations but finds it easy to take decision on allegations without preliminary inquiry. This is one reason and major impediment to the success of any war against corruption. At the NIIA of today, we now have two categories of professors: Council-assisted professors and NIIA professors whose appointments were only based on merit. They are not political professors. I reported to the Supervisory Authority how the Ike Nwachukwu Governing Council had bastardised the NIIA beyond repairs, particularly in terms of indiscipline. Indiscipline is a manifestation of corruption. For a Governing Council to be inciting staff against the Chief Executive is nothing more than an executive corruption. But why?

Without doubt, the Council’s efforts at misinformation were specifically targeted at preventing the renewal of my appointment as Director General of the institute. And true enough, my appointment was not renewed. Many senior citizens, including former Heads of State who used to have high regards for me, opted to declare me a person non-grata in the belief that I was wrong, but not knowing there was misinformation at play. In spite of all these, my integrity is intact. I  derived much happiness that I stood by patriotism and what was right to do. Why should I accept to bastardise academic professorship in order to be in the good books of a Council?

Without gainsaying, accepting free bargaining, concealing the truth in order to be free is only promoting the untruths and Nigeria cannot survive on the basis of promotion of untruths. The use of arm-twisting and intimidation by the EFCC may be wrong and, indeed, it is. How to deal with corruption without arm-twisting and intimidation has to be looked into on a more serious note, and particularly in light of fundamental human rights and on a long term basis.

 In this regard, government will need to declare its anti-corruption war at the crescendo of elite politics and at the lowest level of every given stratum of society. The truth is that, while efforts are being made to stop corruption at the higher levels, the same corruption is rearing its ugly head at the bottom levels of the society. With this, corruption is growing at the tap root level while the branches of corruption are being cut at the top. The message being sent to the international community is incapacity to stop corruption and Nigeria’s international image cannot be helped with this type of situation. This brings us to the second issue: insincerity and unfairness in the political governance of Nigeria.

If corruption has been difficult to nip in the bud in Nigeria, it is essentially because political governance is also largely based on insincerity of purpose, unfairness in the management of common patrimony, and victimisation of the honest and patriotic people. The mania of political governance in Nigeria encourages the development of anti-Nigeria sentiments and this also largely explains why the quest for self-determination is also growing and why national unity is constantly threatened.  I will endeavour to substantiate this observation with cases I am much conversant with and then raise questions.

First, in 1994, the Federal Government of Nigeria advertised the construction of small and medium houses. The advert invited interested Nigerians to make deposits. Alhaji Lateef Jakande was then the Minister of Works and Housing. For the medium houses, the sum of N200,000 (two hundred thousand naira) was the initial cost. The amount was jacked up by Jakande’s successor, Major-General Abdulkareem Adisa to N800,000 (eight hundred thousand naira only), thus raising the required deposit from N40,000 (forty thousand naira) to N165,000 (one hundred and sixty-five thousand naira only. Major-General Adisa considered that the cost of purchase was not realistic. whereas, in the eyes of Jakande, it was feasible, as he was thinking of using local building materials.

Whatever is the case, I paid the initially required N40,000 deposit for the N200,000 medium house bungalow and took loan from the Universal Trust Bank to pay the required balance. We are now in 2017, the Federal Government of Nigeria is yet to build the medium houses. It is yet to allocate any house. It is yet to refund. In fact, the Government does not even talk about it. Is the Federal government not the most corrupt by taking public money for service it does not intend to provide? Government will come out saying it is building houses for civil servants or houses for footballers. What about the houses for which we deposited money? Where is the fairness or justice?

Also in the 1990s, but this time at the level of the OPIC in Ogun State, advert was similarly placed for the purchase of houses. I collected seven forms, one for me and six others for other colleagues at the NIIA. By coincidence, the six others were from Ogun State. When the considerations for allocation of houses took place, I was the only person, an indigene of Ondo State, of which I am most proud of anyway, whose name was removed from the list of potential beneficiaries. Yet we are preaching national unity.

 But as nature would have it, a representative of the Ogun State Government came to seek my help on payment of taxes of NIIA staff to Ogun State and not to the Lagos State Government when I was Director General. The reason was that some NIIA staff were living on the territory of Ogun State. I refused to cooperate because of the way I had been discriminated against. In fact, the Commissioner for Finance apologised that it was not her government that was responsible. She tried to convince me not to continue to hold my grievances for too long. She even asked me to reapply and that she would ensure a speedy action on it. I thanked her but I was no longer interested but I eventually assisted in ensuring that the NIIA staff concerned begin to make payment of the required taxes to the Ogun State Government. What can we say when the Yoruba do discriminate another Yoruba man?

 In Lagos State, under Buba Marwa as military governor, we were allocated land in Isheri North for which we also fully paid. Up till this time of writing, no allocation has been made. Even though explanations were made to the effect of the area being water locked, the truth is that no one is talking about it. No offer of replacement.

The foregoing gives an idea of political governance in Nigeria. There is no follow-up on government projects when there is a new administration. As a result, the people are angered and may not have our type of strong heart to remain patriotic in the face of tribulations. Many other Nigerians in similar situations who may not have the patience cannot but accept common saying: ‘if you cannot beat them, join them.’ This is why corruption thrives. Internationally, how should the international community perceive this type of injustice and unfairness?

The third reason and major impediment to the success of the anti-graft war is the acquiescence or conspiratorial attitude of the people of Nigeria. Grosso modo, the Nigerianess in every citizen of Nigeria is always to leave things to God to handle. Muslims believe that whatever happens is always with the consent of God. Christians believe that they are not suppose to fight or revenge. Traditional rulers now give traditional chieftaincy titles on commercial basis and no longer for bravery and community service. Award of national honours is no longer anything to write home about. All these are acquiesced to by the people of Nigeria. As at today,  the more you are able to steal, the more the laurels. An NIIA Director of Administration and Finance changed the results of a promotion exercise to favour some staff, the Governing Council which is required to investigate it only noted and condoned it. The government itself, this same PMB administration, kept quiet about it. Can corruption be wiped out with these situations? Is an act of serious indiscipline not also an expression of corruption?

Without doubt, Nigeria’s international image under PMB is gradually being tainted without much attention being paid to it. PMB cannot succeed without also carrying along the support of the people. In fact, most people are corrupt and indisciplined. If Government cannot ordinarily control traffic indiscipline on Nigerian roads, especially in Lagos and Abuja effectively, why should anyone expect much from anti-graft war? Why is there a different law, so to say, for keke Marwa and commercial buses in Lagos?

PMB should first remove the tap root of corruption, before dealing with corruption at whatever level he desires in such a way that everyone will draw lessons from it. Alternatively, the approach should be both bottom and top simultaneously. As it is today, PMB is praised for his efforts but no one is talking about the international reservations underlying the songs of praise. International politics is about praising and undermining for purposes of national interest. The praise singers of today are coming back tomorrow to condemn.

Besides, contemporary international relations is witnessing a return to national protectionism in which emphasis is being placed on ‘the nation first.’ Nigeria’s national unity is under threat. The IPOB is quarrelling with the lecture of the British High Commissioner in Abuja. The self-determinationists are expecting help from Donald Trump. The anti-graft war is dividing, rather than uniting. It is only the truth and objectivity of purpose, without fear or favour, that can help sustain national unity regardless of whatever method is adopted in fighting corruption and indiscipline in the country. In the absence of truth and objectivity, Nigeria’s international image under PMB cannot but become very negative by the end of his term in 2019.

 Most importantly, national unity by end of 2019, should be addressed, not in the manner of manu militari, but in the manner of truth-driven reconciliation processes.