CSOs call on Nigerians to own anti-graft war

By Musa Adamu Abuja

Nigerians have been urged to take ownership of the anti- corruption fight in the country.
Nigeria has also been asked to see the recent report released by the Transparency International (TI) indicating that the country had slipped further down in the global rankings as a wakeup call and not a rubbish of its efforts.
The Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC) and the Transparency International stated this in Abuja at a workshop to share international anti- corruption best practices to address emerging issues.
The theme of the event is “Preventing the facilitation of corruption in public and private sectors: Leveraging on international frameworks to promote sustainable development.”
The organisers said the aim of the workshop to share international anti -corruption best practices to address emerging issues. Saying Nigerians must resolve to kill corruption before it kills Nigeria, Musa said it was the importance attached to fighting corruption by the civil society that makes them organize such events once in a while.
He said: “We believe that to deal with corruption decisively we need all to be on board. The government cannot be left alone with this.”
He said in order to have effective fight against corruption, Nigeria must take compliance with legislation such as Freedom of Information Act and observance of the Public Procurement Act serious He further called on the nation’s security agencies to drop their ego and work together for the success of the fight against corruption.
He said in view of the negative effects of corruption in the country, there was the need for the relevant agencies of government to fast track the process operationalisation of the National Anti- corruption strategy.
Also speaking, Chairman, Board of Trustees (BOT), CISLAC, YZ Ya’u, said it was obvious that corruption was responsible for the failure of many government initiatives.
He emphasised that for Nigeria to have an effective fight against corruption, it must be a collective responsible of every Nigerians as it would be irresponsible to leave the fight to government alone.
On his part, Dr Kole Shettima, Africa Director, MacArthur Foundation, said the theme of the workshop was very important because nigeria had geared its efforts at naming, shaming and jailing the corrupts, saying it was time to ficus in how to prevent it.
He said: “So, it good that we are here to see how we can prevent rather that fight. Our corruption fight should be geared towards improvement of quality of lives, open governance and preventing needless communal clashes in the country.”
A former Minister of Education, Obi Ezekwesili, said the mindset that tends to define corruption in one direction was dangerous because that would give excuse for bad behaviors and impunity to thrive.