Chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), Dr Bolaji Owasanoye, said Transparency International (TI) 2021’s rating where Nigeria scored 24 out of 100 points — ranking 154 out of 180 countries, was based on outdated data sources.
The anti-graft agency boss said Nigerians should question TI’s assessment parameters which gave western countries receiving Illicit Financial Flows a clean bill while thumbing down countries that are victims of graft.
Owasanoye disclosed this at a two-day training workshop for journalists organised by the ICPC at the Anti-Corruption Academy of Nigeria, Keffi, Nasarawa State.
He observed that the data sources on which the ranking was based did not take into cognisance the advances against graft recorded by the country.
The Media Consultant to the ICPC chairman, Oluyinka Akintunde, in a presentation said the global anti-corruption coalition assessment of Nigeria was based on outdated data sources.
Nigeria has dropped five places on the 2021 corruption perception index published by TI on Tuesday.
This is the worst ranking Nigeria has got under President Muhammadu Buhari administration.
In the 2020 index, Nigeria had scored 25 out of 100 points, ranking 149 out of the 180 countries surveyed.
In 2015, Nigeria was ranked 136th; 136th in 2016; 148th in 2017; 144th in 2018; 146th in 2019, and 149th in 2020.
The national chapter of Transparency International (TI), Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC), said the CPI aggregates data from eight different sources that provide perceptions by experts and business people on the level of corruption in the public sector.
CISLAC said the CPI result is coming when the country is battling rising nationwide insecurity, high unemployment and damning revelations around public finance management.
The organisation said the index does not show specific incidents of corruption in the country but the perception of corruption.
The organisation enumerated seven weaknesses that impede Nigeria’s fight against corruption, while calling for an immediate improvement for the sake of ordinary Nigerians.
The seven listed weaknesses are: damning audit report, security sector corruption,failure to investigate high profile corruption cases and prevent Illicit financial flows (IFFs), absence of asset recovery, protection of whistle-blowers and other key anti-corruption legal frameworks, judicial challenges, corruption in the COVID-19 response, and Twitter ban, shrinking civic space and intimidation of human rights defenders.
