Power in a vacuum
Power, they say, corrupts. And absolute power corrupts absolutely. This fact is basically the reason why this part of the world lags behind significantly in almost all social development indices. Since the inception of the Fourth Republic, the Nigerian polity has discussed and address the problem of corruption from a single dimensional perspective of moral […]
Power, they say, corrupts. And absolute power corrupts absolutely. This fact is basically the reason why this part of the world lags behind significantly in almost all social development indices. Since the inception of the Fourth Republic, the Nigerian polity has discussed and address the problem of corruption from a single dimensional perspective of moral rot.
But that is the problem.
We tend to look at the question of corruption as something to do with the innate perversion of the Nigerian or African spirit. And that those countries or people who are ahead of us on the development ladder are naturally more advanced or incorruptible.
Analysing political corruption as a distinct but separate entity from bureaucratic corruption, it is pertinent to separate these two very different social phenomena in a way that is often overlooked in contemporary analyses. Political corruption includes two basic, critical and related processes: extractive and power-preserving corruption.
The theoretical basis of corruption in Nigeria provides a political-economy analysis of this fact. Outlining how and who is involved, these cases explore the present conditions that enable political corruption and point to the fundamental fact of a tense vacuum in the power structure of the Nigerian state as well as other African nations or even the Global South.
Official corruption, caused by this vacuum, is widespread especially, in new African countries in the postcolonial period and has contributed considerably to political instability, public distrust of the government, and economic reverses and failure to attract foreign capital. Corruption cases can be categorized according to the status of corrupt officials, i.e., petty officials and top-level officials. Petty officials are influenced by problems arising from the emergence of new societies and by traditional social structures such as an extended family system encouraging parasitism. Major corruption results from abuse of powers and privileges of high office.
Typically, minor corrupt officials are tried and prosecuted, while corrupt officials in high office remain untouchable because there is an effective institutional vacuum when these institutions deal with powerful men. Likewise, preventive efforts such as attitude modification through public information campaigns, general education, and improvement of the professionals’ circumstances affect petty corrupt officials, but do not curb major vice. Effective control of corruption is only possible through organisations independent of the government and through strict laws to enforce principles of good conduct at high government levels, including controls on foreign bank accounts. Furthermore, legal approaches to the problem differ between democratic and socialist countries. In general, however, African anti-corruption laws are ineffective because top officials fail to enforce them from lack of authority or from fear of international repercussions, hence the vacuum.
Filling up this vacuum will mean the prevention of dishonest acts, through careful supervision by high officials in general, and will require good examples rather than through application of draconian repressive measures which are applied selectively.
The alien governance structures imposed by colonial Europeans is also of note. The focus of the structure on chiefs, as opposed to the formal state, is a notable departure from much of the current literature on the determinants of corruption. Even though state capacity is considered an important precondition for economic development, the contemporary African institutions bequeathed were designed to be weak either by omission or commission. Chiefs remain influential on a wide range of local issues. In their role as custodians of land, traditional rulers often exert influence over the allocation of land and the distribution of land rents.
These rulers, in many parts of Nigeria also enter into deals with mining companies on behalf of rural communities, regularly resulting in serious corruption practices. Further, chiefs engage in governance roles, such as the administration of justice and contract enforcement, the collection of taxes, and the provision of public goods. In addition to their direct role in local governance, chiefs exert influence on the central state via lobbying as well as mobilising their local networks and resources for election campaigns. They also interact with governments at state and federal levels acting either as substitutes or complements to governments. Their accountability is likely to have considerable implications for the quality of governance and economic development in many Nigerian communities.
The role of chiefs in governance vary across Africa depending on the colonizer. The legacy of British versus French colonial rule on the corruption of chiefs in Africa created the vacuum in effective governance. A number of studies associates British rule with lower levels of corruption, as compared to that of French rule… which some argue, underscores the supremacy of the British legal system in ensuring the accountability of state institutions, such as the executive and the judiciary but that is only a comparative analysis since both Anglophone and Francophone Africa are all corrupt. In colonial Africa administered by Britain, much of the control happened through chiefs, rather than the central state. Hence, the formal legal systems introduced by the colonial powers, while mostly applicable to the central state, had limited relevance for governing much of the population. Many scholars of African political economy also emphasise the limited role of the state in much of their hinterlands.
An important feature of British rule was the considerable autonomy that it offered chiefs in ruling the local population while shifting their accountability primarily to their colonial master, as opposed to the local population. This undermined precolonial constraints on the chiefs’ abuse of power and empowered them over the population. In contrast, the French colonial policy systematically undermined the power of chiefs. They were stripped of the power to appoint sub-chiefs and handle legal matters. As agents of the colonial power, their primary task was to collect taxes and recruit labour. Unlike their British counterparts, their control over the expenditure of the budget and land resources was limited, which diminished their opportunity to distribute rents and extend patronage networks.
In my opinion, the way out for us is about control… control of power, essentially the elimination of the vacuums that facilitate abuse of power and/or corruption.