Despite claims by the Federal Government that it is making progress in its fight against corruption the reverse is the case according to the latest Corruption Perception Index, CPI, released Wednesday, February 21, 2018, by the Transparency International, TI.
From the document, Nigeria which garnered 28 from 100 points last year, dropped to 27 points and was thus ranked 148 out of 180 countries, a significant 12 places below where it’s ranking the previous year.
Pundits affirm that the ranking will come as a blow to the President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration, which although it came to office on anti-corruption manta, is being criticized for the procedures it has so far adopted in wedging the war.
Several Nigerians had criticized the administration for condoning corruption by its top-ranking officials, and uses sledge hammer against political opponents.
Also, Supreme Court remarks against the shoddy prosecution of corruption cases by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, and Office of the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, AGF, had not helped matters.
Although the administration has placed several suspects on trial and seized assets of politicians and officials that served in the previous Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, government, it is yet to convince the public that it was applying the same stick when officials of the present All Progressives Congress, APC, are caught in the web of corrupt practices.
Yesterday’s TI index, ranked 180 countries and territories by their perceived levels of public sector corruption using a scale of 0 to 100. 0 is classified as being highly corrupt while 100 is dubbed very clean.
It was observed from the table that this year’s index placed several countries as making little or no progress in tackling corruption. It also shows that journalists and activists in highly corrupt countries risk their lives every day in an effort to expose corruption.
The report found that more than two-thirds of the countries scored below 50. The average score was 43.
From the report, New Zealand and Denmark ranks highest with scores of 89 and 88 respectively, while Syria, South Sudan and Somalia rank lowest with scores of 14, 12 and 9 respectively.
The best performing region are the Western European countries with an average score of 66, while the worst performing regions are found in the Sub-Saharan Africa with an average score of 32.
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