President Goodluck
Jonathan recently
downplayed Nigeria’s
corruption problems,
saying that most of what
is referred to as
corruption is no more
than ‘common stealing’.
His claim is wrong.
A US-Africa summit last
week opened with
warnings about the toll
corruption takes on
development, sparking
discussion about the
extent of the problem in
Africa and how it is
defined. That’s an issue
which Nigeria’s president
has also been debating of
late.
On May 5, Goodluck
Jonathan responded to
allegations that he is not
doing enough to curb
corruption among his
ministers by claiming that
most of what is referred
to as corruption is not
really that at all.
“Over 70% of what are
called corruption (cases),
even by EFCC (Economic
and Financial Crimes
Commission) and other
anti-corruption agencies,
is not corruption, but
common stealing,” the
president told national
television, saying the
corruption claims
appeared “politically
motivated”.
Barely two weeks later,
Ekpo Nta, the chairman of
the Independent Corrupt
Practices Commission
(ICPC), one of Nigeria’s
anti-corruption agencies,
told an audience in Abuja
that “stealing is
erroneously reported as
corruption” even by
“educated” Nigerians.
So was the president right
to dismiss most
corruption claims as being
nothing of the sort? Africa
Check decided to look at
the definitions.
Is corruption simply
stealing?
Put simply, while stealing
can be defined as taking a
person or organisation’s
rightful property without
their permission,
corruption is not one but
a whole range of
misdeeds, the common
factor in which is the
abuse of a person’s office
for personal gain. As this
attempt to define
corruption makes clear, it
can range from the petty
corruption of junior
officials – bribe-taking by
police officers on the
street corner for example
– through high-level
embezzlement and theft
of public funds to the
payment or receipt of
bribes made to affect
office-holders’ decisions in
office.
The key difference with
“common stealing” is that
the people who break
into a house and steal,
have no authority over
the house or property.
And people who carry out
a corrupt act do have that
trust as a public office
holder of some sort and
abuse it for their own
gain.
And it is this abuse of
public trust that explains
why civil society groups
and others see corruption
as a more serious crime
than typical “common
stealing.”
How is corruption
defined in Nigerian
law?
So is the president right in
terms of law? The answer
is no. Under Nigeria’s
Corrupt Practices and
Other Related Offences
Act of 2000, the term
corruption does indeed
apply to crimes such as
the theft or
embezzlement of public
funds, but also to bribery,
fraud and “other related
offences”.
And in all these cases, it is
corruption only if the
person in question has
carried out the offence
through the office they
hold.
Section 382 of the
Nigerian Criminal Code,
by contrast, provides a
much simpler description
of theft, unrelated to the
role a person take in life.
A thief is simply “a person
who fraudulently takes …
or fraudulently converts
to his own use or to the
use of any other person
anything capable of being
stole”.
Is the pattern of
corruption changing?
So the president is clearly
wrong to claim that the
theft of public funds by
those in public office is
simple theft, and not
corruption.
But could he be right to
say that the pattern of
corruption is changing and
that today “over 70%” of
cases now relate to theft
of public funds, not
bribery and other such
offences.
Here, there does seem to
be some evidence of a
trend. Speaking at the
50th anniversary of his old
school, Ilesa Grammar
School, Osun State, the
2005-2010 chairman of
the ICPC, Emmanuel
Olayinka Ayoola, said that
the nature of corruption it
uncovered had changed
in recent years.
“The commonest form of
corruption in Nigeria used
to be bribery but in
recent years, this has
been overtaken in level
of prevalence by
embezzlement and theft
from public funds,” he
said, though without
providing figures.
Africa Check this week
asked the EFCC to say
what percentage of
corruption cases they
have investigated since
2010 would fall under the
broad category of theft
and embezzlement of
public funds, and what
would fall under bribery
and other offences.
If or when they reply we
will update this report.
Is the level of
corruption changing?
It is difficult to say. Many
public commentators say
that it is.
However Nigeria’s
ranking in anti-corruption
group Transparency
International’s Corruption
Perceptions Index – which
lists countries based on
how corrupt their public
sector is perceived to be
– is little changed from
when Jonathan took over
as president in 2010.
In 2013 Nigeria ranked
144 out of 177 countries
in the index. In 2011,
Nigeria ranked 143.
Conclusion – Corruption
is more than ‘common
stealing’
The way officials talk
about crime matters. And
President Jonathan’s claim
earlier this year that more
than 70 percent of
corruption cases today
relate to nothing more
than “common stealing”
appears to be an attempt
to downplay what remains
a massive problem in
Nigeria.
It is also wrong in law.
The theft of public funds
through the abuse of an
official’s office is different
from “common stealing”
because of the abuse of
trust it entails.
And it is because it
reduces the funds
available for public
spending, distorts the
decisions made by office
holders and undermines
public trust, that
corruption has such a
negative effect on
Nigeria’s development as
numerous studies have
shown.
In the end, whether the
pattern of corruption is
changing – from bribery
to theft of public funds –
matters less than that the
overall level of corruption
appears not to have
changed at all.
Edited by Eleanor
Whitehead and Peter
Cunliffe-Jones
Source: Africa Check, a
non-profit fact-
checking website
(www.africacheck.org).
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