Traffic Lights and Nigeria's Natural Resource Charter (NRC)

The Natural Resource Charter (NRC) is a useful framework for assessing the governance of Nigeria’s extractive industries. The 2012 assessment was carried out by an expert panel with research carried out by a number of Nigerian think tanks and civil society groups. It covered the 12 main areas identified for good governance of extractives.  From the assessment, Nigeria had 9 red traffic light ratings (meaning serious problems) out of the 12 precepts. The 3 areas that were amber (meaning problems, but not all bad) were Fiscal Regime and Contractual Terms, Stabilising Expenditure and Private sector investment.

Link here to the NNRC website containing the full report and the option to rate Nigeria against the 12 precepts for yourself. 

TI Global Corruption Barometer gets instant response from Kenya's police

Interesting article from Kenya, showing the Inspector General of Police's response to the recent TI report that ranked Kenya's police as the most corrupt public institution. The IG urged citizens to capture evidence of illicit transactions with police on their mobile phones and said they would get tougher with those caught.

Nigerian Police were also identified as one of the most corrupt public institutions according to the global corruption barometer. It will be interesting to see if there is an equally positive reaction from the Nigerian counterparts.

Kenya: Stop Bribing My Officers - Kimaiyo (article)

Simple ways to present complex findings

Long, complex reports with important findings regularly fail to have the needed impact. People need to understand the 'so what' of a report in order for them to put pressure for change.   This is true for anti-corruption reforms as it is for any other complex policy area.

Yourbudgit.com have been doing a good job in simplifying complex information and helping people to visualise important Nigerian policy issues. See link below for a good example:

Yourbudgit.com

Voice of the voiceless - ‘Ordinary Ahmad’

There are few public voices in Nigeria ready to speak truth to power.  The story of ‘Ordinary Ahmad’ is far from ordinary. Ahmad Isah hosts a regular morning call in radio show ‘the Brekete family’, where Nigerians in the Federal Capital Territory come to Ahmad with their problems. His show enables citizens to voice complaints on wide ranging issues from non-payment of pensions, unfair dismissal, poor treatment in government hospitals etc.  Many of these issues are strongly linked to corruption.

Ordinary Ahmad regularly makes phone calls to Nigeria’s top government officials and politicians live on air to help resolve citizen’s problems. This is accountability at its most direct.  His show has been off air for almost four weeks. No one seems to be sure why. I join other Nigerians in hoping that his show will come back on air soon.

A taste of ‘Ordinary Ahmad’ in action.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcQBiL7dJrM

‘Corruption has increased’ – say majority of Nigerians, ‘but we can make a difference’

                                                                                                                            

According to Transparency International’s Global Corruption Barometer which surveyed a 1000 Nigerians, there is good and bad news for Nigeria’s fight against corruption:

Bad News

• 85% of Nigerians believe that corruption has increased over the last two years.
• 94% believe corruption is a problem in the Public Sector.
•  72% believe Government is run by a few big entities acting in their own self-interest
• 75% believe the Government is ineffective in its fight against corruption.The institutions perceived to be the most corrupt were political parties and the police, while 81% admitted to having paid a bribe to the police.
• 24% reported paying a bribe to the judiciary.

Good news

• 56% of Nigerians (a slight majority) believe that ordinary citizens can make a difference in the fight against corruption.

Despite the depressing statistics on what Nigerians believe and have experienced on corruption, we can take encouragement that a slight majority believe that ordinary citizens can make a difference. The challenge for Nigeria is working out how.

http://www.transparency.org/gcb2013/country/?country=nigeria