Corruption Index: Nigerians, Not Buhari Responsible For Poor Rating – Presidency

The Presidency has blamed Nigerians for the country’s poor ranking on Transparency International’s 2020 Corruption Perception Index.

In the report, Nigeria scored 25 out of 100 and ranked 149 out of 180 countries indicating that the level of corruption in the country has worsened. It further named Nigeria as the second most corrupt nation in West Africa.

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Speaking on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily programme on Monday, Garba Shehu, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, said the poor ranking is a reflection of corruption by Nigerians and not by the Buhari administration.

According to him, the indices used by Transparency International to draw it’s conclusions were essentially based on problems by Nigerians and not the Buhari administration.

He said: “I will tell you that this one by TI is not a judgment on Buhari or his administration or its war against corruption, I will tell you that this one is a judgment on Nigerians because if you look at the indices they used at arriving at these conclusions, they used eight indices, six of which showed Nigeria as being more or less Nigeria in the same position.

“The two that they dwelled on, that caused this backslide, are essentially Nigerian problems. They are talking about the political culture of this country, vote-buying, thuggery. Is it Buhari that is a thug? We are not doing thuggery.

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“And when they talk about the justice sector, they are talking about perceived corruption in the judiciary. These perceptions are essentially not correct. Yes, there are issues in that sector but so many changes are going on in that sector wouldn’t it have been nice if they acknowledged it so that you encourage those judicial officers that are upright, and then the system gets better.”

Recall that the report released last week drew conclusions from 13 data sources capturing the assessment of experts and business executives on a number of corrupt behaviours in the public sector including bribery, diversion of public funds, use of public office for private gain and nepotism in the civil service.

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