Governance and Accountability in Nigeria

BY
ALHAJI ABDULLAHI ffiRAHIM, CON, SAN, FNIALS,
FCI arb.
BEING A LECTURE AT THE IGALA VI( ANNUAL
GENERAL
MEETING IN LONDON ON THE 3
RD
OF SEPTEMBER,
2011
- 0 clarifv
1
What is Governance?
BEING A LECTURE BY ALHAIT ABDULLAHI IBRAHIM, CON,
SAN, FNIALS, FCI arb. AT THE IGALA UK ANNUAL GENERAL
MEETING IN LONDON ON THE 3
RD
OF SEPTEMBER 2011
Governance and Accountability in Nigeria
It gives me great pleasure to share my thoughts with this
distinguished audience on a topical issue as this. I thank the
organisers for giving me yet another opportunity to contribute my
quota to their noble quest for a better and more humane society
through improved governance and accountability. I am delighted to
note that despite the fact that the members of this Association are
based in the UK which is thousands of miles away from our
homeland, Nigeria, your commitment to the cause of good and
accountable governance at home remains emphatic and unmistakable.
This IS not at all surprising. Your daily experience of good and
::o:mtaDle governance in a developed society as this cannot but
- .: : ~ :- ~ . roved gO\'ernance at home.
- nn ~ o man I e -ami iar. i - e Im n or si tl an e
appears to have been lost to many in our country, especially the elite
who wield governmental powers for the time being. In the same vein,
the term 'accountability' equally seems to have lost its meaning
despite being frequently mouthed by politicians and other government
officials in public speeches and official statements. It is therefore
necessary that I define my terms.
Governance is simply the process of governing or controlling
the affairs of a country or any other socio-political entity. Governance
is not an end in it- self but a means to an end. That end is to secure the
collective well-being and security of the populace. The body of
~ .
- - -.;:r.... ....
=
concept is well described by the Constitution of the Federal Republi
of Nigeria in chapter 2 which lays down the 'Fundamental
Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy'. I shall
consider these briefly anon.
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What is Accountability?
Accountability refers to the obligation of public officials and
institutions to submit their activities to scrutiny by the members of the
public, and by the organs and institutions of government vested with
the power to carry out such scrutiny. It demands compliance with
procedures that will deter and detect wrongdoing. A government is
regarded as accountable if its activities are exposed to the searchlight
of public scrutiny, including that of the opposition. The concept is
individuals and institutions that carry on governance is known as the
government. The government is a product of a social contract with the
electorates who instituted it for the good of the community. The
concept of representative democracy is a pragmatic response to the
felt need for effective governance. As all the people could not rule
themselves directly, they settled for elected representatives who are
vested with governmental powers to control the affairs of the country.
It follows therefore that the powers of the government must be used to
advance the welfare of the people or 'the greatest good of the
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greatest number', to borrow the popular phrase of Jeremy Bentham.
Any government or ruler that fails to do this loses legitimacy and is
not entitled to enjoy the support of right-thinking members of the
society. Governance for its own sake is meaningless unless it carries
with it the notion of good governance. Therefore, a government that
advances the welfare of the general public is generally referred to as
-ernment'. The concept good governance has in recent times
'on and support. As Thomas Frank has
r=",,-;-..- - ~ - ~ . g a global entitlement
closely linked with the concept of responsibility, which means that the
government, being a creation of the people, must be subject to
correction, control and eventual removal by the people. Transparency
is a key component of accountability. It simply connotes that public
officials and institutions must be answerable and accessible to the
general public. The government must be ready to provide answers to
questions about its activities unless it is in the interest of peace and
security to withhold such information. Both transparency and
accountability are indispensable to good governance.
Constitutional Framework for Good Governance
Right from its Preamble to the substantive provIsions and
schedules, the Nigerian Constitution harps on the importance of good
governance. Indeed, this objective runs through the Constitution as
imperfect as it may be. I personally believe that no matter how good a
itution may be on paper, the attitudes, values, education
~ .-. e l' 0 le who are expected to implement it matter
Id still make progress if its
::1- _ - ;." e right vaIu ,
wh n a ocietv with
-
~ o o d laws is not blessed with good and honest leaders who can make
the laws work. This perhaps explains why our country continues to
experience underdevelopment, insecurity, abuse of office, lawlessness
and other symptoms of bad governance despite possessing many well
crafted legal and constitutional provisions. Take for example, the
following provisions of our constitution:
The Preamble to the 1999 Nigerian Constitution underscores the
importance of good governance in these words, '... And to provide for
a Constitution for the purpose of promoting good government and
welfare of all persons in our country on the principles of Freedom,
Equality and Justice, andfor the purpose of consolidating the unity
ofour people:... '
3
4
Constitutional and Legal Framework for Accountability
-
. .
=
Similarly, Chapter Two enshrines a wide range of social,
economic, political, educational, environmental, foreign policy and
other objectives of the country aimed at promoting the ideals of
freedom, dignity, justice, equality, rule of law and development.
Although these objectives are non-justiciable, they are to be observed
and implemented in governmental programmes. It has been suggested
that these principles set a parameter for the attainment of good
governance.
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~ . . 'in." ' O ~ -
mas es and the government is made a countable to the electorates for
its acts and omissions.
Furthermore, Chapter Four provides for an elaborate set of
fundamental rights including the right to life, human dignity,
expression, conscience and worship, non-discrimination and so on.
The existence and respect for these rights will promote good
governance in the country.
Unfortunately however, the existence of these rights appears to
'e made only a minimal impact on the lives of the majority of
_ .,.... ~ 3.Se of our country makes clear that merely
doe no nece aril....
Our Constitution and laws are not short of provisions for
maintaining transparency and accountability of government. A few of
these may be highlighted. Firstly, the doctrine of separation of powers
is incorporated into sections 4, 5, and 6 of the constitution. It posits
that in the exercise of its legislative functions, the National Assembly
and the Houses of Assembly are accountable to the courts of law. The
executive is made accountable to the legislature which could be an
effective platform for mobilising public opinion against abuse of
power by the executive. However, a legislature that is deeply
enmeshed in corruption and influence peddling can hardly serve as a
credible check on the executive. The situation is even worse at the
state level where some houses of assembly are completely suppliant
to the executive. Such legislatures that have sold their independence
to the executive cannot demand accountability from that arm of
government. The situation is worsened by the fact that in many
Houses of Assembly, the Governor's party often controls
overwhelming if not full majority. The absence of effective
opposition in our Houses of Assembly does not augur well for good
governance and accountability. Strangely enough, several Houses of
Assembly reportedly voted against constitutional amendment
proposal that was intended to strengthen their financial independence
of the executive arm.
Our legislative assemblies have much to learn from the maturity
and independence of the advanced democracies which effectively
- . r .d he k the tendencies of the executive to fall below
a .,oi ill and creativity of the legislative
~ _ - = of e,eral
- -=-:.-.:' - -: -- ~ : .... -- - ~ r ~ -e of ro\iding
more e e ti,oe O\oersight oyer the pending of gO\ernment funds and
exercise of governmental powers.
The presidential system of government seems to accord
considerable primacy to the executive. It places the President in a
position to co-ordinate both the executive and legislative processes of
government. Care must be taken to ensure that the executive powers
do not undermine accountability and constitutionalism. The danger of
absolutism heightens when the President or Governor enjoys total and
uncritical support of the members of the legislative body. In some
cases the Houses may be bought over with favours which ought to be
used for providing communal needs. Unfortunately, this seems to be
the case in many of our states where the executive and the legislature
are occupied by members of the same political party.
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Institutions of Accountability
The Constitution establishes a number of institutions for the
purpose of ensuring accountability by public officials. These
institutions include the Code of Conduct Bureau which is vested with
power to receive declarations of assets by public officers and examine
such declarations in order to ensure compliance with the code. The
Code makes provisions for monitoring the personal integrity of all
public officers who must, immediately after taking office and at
stipulated intervals, submit to the Bureau a written declaration of their
properties, assets and liabilities and those of their wives and
unmarried children under the age of eighteen. Further, it prohibits
bribery and places restriction on loans, gifts or other benefits to
an public officials.
:5......... 0 ...
- e Coee ofCondu t Tribunal which is empowered
.- - ~ C - ~ :- Cnd:. t and to impo sanctions upon
a ropna e.
The Office of the Auditor-General is established for the purpose
of auditing and reporting on the public accounts of the Federation and
of all offices and courts of the Federation to the National Assembly.
An equivalent office exists for the states. The Auditor-General is
vested with the power to conduct periodic checks of all government
statutory corporations, commissions, authorities and agencies. It may
be observed that successive governments (whether military or
civilian) have not taken the question of financial accountability
seriously. The political office holders and civil servants seem to share
the same attitude in this regard. Consequently, government accounts
are often not audited for years. This negative attitude has further been
compounded by the prevailing poor standard of accounting practice.
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All these must be corrected as a matter of urgency so that audited
public accounts can be promptly made available for open scrutiny and
debate by the legislative branch. However, a legislature that is
enmeshed in fmancial mess would not be able to summon the moral
courage required to provide oversight of public spending.
The judiciary is yet another institution of accountability. Over
the years, the judiciary, although made fairly independent by
successive Nigerian constitutions, remains a weak and ineffective
check on corruption because of outdated and inefficient procedures,
delay in the determination of cases, court congestion, poor working
conditions of judges and lack of moral courage on the part of some
judges. However, some of the delays and inefficiencies in the
administration ofjustice are due to the attitudes of the prosecution and
the defence alike who sometimes seek unnecessary adjournments.
Recent events in the judiciary show that the judiciary itself must be
t to mechanisms of accountability. The recommendations
Eso Panel (of which I was a member) for the
. :0 L mm as Judicial
- . -- -- r d as a wa . of further
--r ngthening the judi iary and making it accountable. I will say no
more on this as the recent conflict between the former Chief Justice of
Nigeria and Hon. Justice Salami is now subjudice.
Other constitutional provisions for accountability include the
multi-party system, the conduct of periodic elections, the recall of
legislators and impeachment provisions though a few of these have so
far been used by the voters.
Factors Inhibiting Good and Accountable Governance
Despite the above provisions the emergence of good and
accountable governance remains a dream in the country. The factors
responsible for this include lack of leadership by example, lack of
commitment by the political parties to values of integrity and
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accountability; ignorance and pervasive illiteracy which makes it easy
for politicians to manipulate the electorates for selfish political gains,
greed on the part of the political elite and the resultant rat race for the
primitive accumulation of ill-gotten wealth. Many of these factors are
traceable to the quality of individuals who occupy the public offices.
Most political office holders are people who could afford to spend
huge sums of money on election campaigns right from party primaries
to the main elections. When such people win elections, can they be
stopped from recouping the money spent and helping themselves to as
much more as possible in preparation for subsequent elections? This
therefore becomes a vicious cycle and one hopes that the cycle will be
snapped one day. This also makes it impossible for them to trigger the
accountability mechanisms in the Constitution and other laws.
Similarly, the 'money bags' or 'political godfathers' who sponsor
candidates for elections often expect to be given juicy contracts and
I ra i\'e political appointments which would enable them to recoup
~ e ,-', This group is joined by young persons sometimes
,..,_.' ~ ' t' -ome ase, put bluntly thugs
-,.., ri' - e mie. These
=5 5:<::- :n; . 0.. e peration and use of yiolence
and abuse of office at all levels. They endanger the future of
democracy in the country.
The Consequences of Lack of Good and Accountable Governance
Poverty and Underdevelopment-
Despite being the one of the most populated countries, the
seventh largest producer of crude oil in the world and one of the most
highly endowed with mineral resources, our country remains one of
the most impoverished in Africa and one of the poorest in the world.
As noted by Mallam Nasir El Rufai, the World Bank includes Nigeria
in the list of the top 15 places with the highest incidence of poverty.'4
Nigeria remains the only African country and one of the four
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countries worldwide that are yet to overcome the epidemic of
preventable polio. It is disheartening that our country remains part of
this unenviable league.
:\igeria continues to incur huge economic and financial losses as
a result of poor infrastructure such as bad roads and epileptic power
supply. The most basic of all transportation remains the road. Bad
roads increase the rate of wear and tear of vehicles and worsen
poverty as goods cannot be easily transported from one part of the
country to another. It can take as long as eight hours to travel from
Lokoja to Abuja owing to vehicular congestion and high rate of
accidents on the road. It has been argued that thousands of commuters
die gradually or have their lifespan reduced as a result of daily stress
occasioned by deplorable roads. 'This is beside the wanton carnage
that results from ubiquitous pot holes, bowl-holes and craters on our
roads. ,5
........f;..........r
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Pervasive Insecurity-
Tongues are wagging and eyebrows are raised about the state of
insecurity of life and property in the country. Ranging from the recent
group called Boko Haram in the North East and FCT, Ethno-religious
mayhem on the Plateau, Kidnappers and Armed Robbers in various
parts of the country, bomb explosions in Abuja and environs, there is
hardly any safe haven in the country now. Many have rightly argued
that the root causes of all these consist largely in joblessness and drug
abuse by young school leavers who feel disappointed and frustrated.
While recourse to criminality and other anti-social behaviour may not
be an acceptable response, many youths lack the moral fibre and
amily upport that could restrain their exuberant tendencies and
-- 1- --imperative that families play some important roles in
- of [amil." -alues once more.
Suggestions
At this juncture, let me make a few suggestions for bringing
about good governance in our country.
Devolve More Resources to the States and Local Governments
Revisit the revenue allocation formula. A major bane of the
national economy is the lopsided character of the annual Federal
Budget which commits a huge proportion of budgetary allocation to
recurrent expenditure while leaving a small part to capital
expenditure. There is also the concentration of too much funds at the
Federal level where the capacity to utilise these funds is limited. The
situation is not helped by the growing expenditure profile of the
National Assembly. It has lost the moral stature to call any other
government agency to order. The much publicised power sector probe
:: ," " ,-a:ional As embly has not yielded a single successful
- - 'ere 0 d "an ing. Indeed. some of
H'..1.,,,CC: rc" their s ats in
;20 - ......
"-:-.---
Although the Constitution provides for representation of states in the
federal cabinet, there is the fear that the cabinet may become over
bloated with the possibility of overlap in responsibilities. One also has
to take into consideration the fact that Special Assistants and other
aides can be and are appointed in the offices of the President, Vice
President and even Ministers. It is worrisome that this trend is copied
even at the state level where Governors appoint all sorts of Special
Assistants and Personal Assistants in unbelievable numbers.
Accelerate Efforts toward Implementing the Millennium
Development Goals (MDGs)
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The Industrial Training Fund should be strengthened to fulfil its
andate of inculcating skills in young Nigerians.
In Yiew of the fact that Agriculture contributes a large proportion of
the GDP, the agricultural sector should be revived. It will be recalled
that agriculture used to be the mainstay of the Nigerian economy prior
to the discovery of oil. The government should provide social
amenities in the rural areas in order to reduce the pressure to abandon
the farms in preference for the urban centres. Efforts should be
heightened to make agriculture more attractive so it can absorb and
retain millions of the nation's unemployed youths. The government
should address the challenge of storage of perishable agricultural
outputs.
The on-going restoration of the railway system should be sustained as
a means not only of moving people but also of transporting
agricultural outputs.
diYersified in order to steer it away from
x - i "e d pendence on oil.
n-e ., ould
It is necessary for all hands to be on deck in mobilising efforts
towards the implementation of the global poverty eradication and
social development targets of the MDGs before the 2015 deadline.
These targets include reducing extreme poverty and hunger, infant
and maternal mortality, disease, and promoting universal access to
basic education and health care. While all levels have
rightly taken the lead in this direction, it should be clear by now that
the efforts of government alone will not suffice. Other stakeholders
such as civil society organisations, community based associations
ought to step into the arena of action towards achieving these targets.
It was recently revealed by no less a public official than the Minister
of Women Affairs and Social Development, Hajiya Zainab Maina that
four million Nigerian girls between the ages of six and eleven do not
attend school.
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Reform the Electoral System
While significant progress was achieved in the conduct of the
2011 General elections, there are still numerous aspects of our
electoral system calling for urgent reform. These include the use of
violence or threat of violence to influence the outcome of elections,
non-prosecution of many perpetrators of election violence (although
the INEe seems to be taking some steps to change this now) and other
election-related offences, excessive use of money for political
campaigns and lack of internal democracy within political parties.
These factors have alienated many credible Nigerians from the arena
of politics which is still dominated by people of questionable
character and shady background. The electoral system must be totally
reformed. Many of these outstanding matters are dealt with by the
recommendations of the Hon. Justice Uwais Electoral Reform Panel.
These recommendations should be adopted in very many cases.
It is clear from the foregoing that accountability is central to good
governance. Therefore, the various legal and constitutional provisions
on accountability must be given practical effect so that our country
can reap the benefits of development at all levels of government. The
enthronement of good governance at the federal, state and local
government level will go a long way in solving many of the problems
currently facing us as a people. It will ensure the consolidation of
democracy, security of life and property, provision of social
amenities, reduction of poverty and unemployment and generally help
to raise the standard of living of our people.
My brothers, sisters and children, I want to thank you for the
opportunity you have given me to address you once again. I wish to
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thank our brothers and sisters from back home who are here present. I
thank you most sincerely. God bless every one of us and grant us a
safe journey on our trips back home.
1 See Freeman, M.D.A., Lloyd's Introduction lo Jurisprudence, (Eighth cd. , Sweet and MaxwelI, London,
2008) pp.269-273
2 Thomas Frank, 'Democracy, Legitimacy and the Rule of Law: Linkages' in Dorsen and Gifford, eds,
Democracy and the Rule of Law (CQ Press Washington, 200 I) p.176.
3 Bolaji Owasanoye, 'Transparency, Accountability and Good Governance Under the Constitution'
(paper presented at the National Conference on Issues in the 1999 Constitution) NIALS p.3
4 See Nasir El Rufai, 'Nigeria: Rich Country, Poor People' This Day, Friday 19th August, 2011, back page.
s Idowu Abraham, 'Ogun State and Federal Roads', The Nation, Monday August 8, 2011, p.22.
6 This Day August 25, 2011 pA7
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