Corruption: There Is No Governance In Nigeria – Ezekwesili

Pioneer Director-General of Budget
Monitoring and Price Intelligence Unit (Due
Process Unit), Dr Oby Ezekwesili, has called
on Nigerian leaders to take seriously, the
corruption charges levelled against Nigeria
by economy monitoring organisations, both
nationally and internationally.
She spoke at a forum on leadership
organised by the Day Star Christian Centre in
Lagos on Wednesday.
According to her, if the current
administration claims to be fighting
corruption and rating bodies still scores the
country high in graft, it means no significant
progress had been made in the fight against
the menace.
Ezekwesili, a chartered accountant and a co-
founder of Berlin-based Transparency
International, said after 53 years of
independence, Nigeria had no governance
but merely “massive transaction of
operations”.
She said: “There is no good governance in
Nigeria. Good governance is about
governance that gives the highest possible
results and it is on the basis that most of the
time, the best choices of policies are being
made and that results are being clearly
achieved.
“If you look at the misalignment of our
resources and the results, it will tell you that
we have less than the kind of effective
governance that we should have.
According to her, “The government should
review the rankings and tackle corruption as
it should to ensure that obstacles hindering
Nigeria from becoming great are removed.
Recall that the former Minister of Education,
early in the year, alleged that the
governments of presidents Umaru Musa
Yar’Adua and Goodluck Jonathan,
squandered $67 billion in foreign reserve.
“In 2007, the incoming Administration was
handed $45Billion in Foreign Reserve plus
$22Billion,” she stated.
But the allegation was described as
“outlandish and clearly fictitious” by the
Minister of Information, Labaran Maku.
He also said the damning comment by the
former Vice President (African Region) of the
World Bank on education sector, was a self-
indictment as she presided over the sector
without making any positive impact on it.
The Minister added that her criticism only
amounts to hypocrisy as she contributed to
its sorry state because despite receiving
N458.1billion between 2006 and 2007 for the
sector, there is nothing to see in terms of
achievements.
“If she says education has not worked, it
means she is saying she did not work”,
Maku.
In her response, Ezekwesili said: “I Challenge
them to a public debate of facts regarding
2007 Excess Crude Account (ECA) and
foreign reserve and last five and half years
oil revenue.”
However, the Federal Government is yet to
agree to the debate, despite boasting that it
would publicly take on the former Minister,
to present its case.

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