Opinion: How to Take Bribes and Not Be Corrupt - By Abimbola Adelakun

 

The Nigerian ministerial screening, like many things that have characterised Nigeria in the past five months, was a tale of shoddiness, ill-preparedness, and a lackadaisical approach to serious business of public service. What is called National Assembly is a collection of people who spend a lot of time to achieve little and yet get paid heavily for it. The screening took valuable man-hours, cost taxpayers good money but so far has remained uninspiring; simply, a poor continuation of the way things have been done in the past. What the lawmakers perhaps achieved, with the uneventful screening of some people who had ethical questions to answer bordering on their record of public service, was a legitimation of corruption and erosion of whatever of our values that lingers.

There were however moments of mirthless hilarity in the screening process. One came when ex-governor of Rivers State, Chibuike Amaechi, said he had never taken a bribe in his life and that he detested corruption. I have met Amaechi at a public function a few times and he is someone with a robust sense of humour. On this count, however, he outdid himself. It is a curious surprise that the entire Senate did not explode with laughter.

In the past few months, Nigerian public officers seem to be speaking against corruption more ardently than ever. The other day, it was the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, who declared himself an anti-corruption fighter. Nowadays, it is the former governor of Lagos, Bola Tinubu, who speaks against corruption louder than anyone else.

 

Since President Muhammadu Buhari began to ride his anti-corruption unicorn in the Nigerian public square, it has suddenly become fashionable for everyone to present themselves as loathing corruption even if they do not mean it. One of my endless fascinations with Nigeria is how people — regardless of positions they occupy — manage to condemn corruption while ecstatically wading in it. Nigerians seem to see corruption everywhere except in themselves and/or the person they love.

On the one hand, this social characteristic can simply be ascribed to hypocrisy. On the other hand, it could also be that corruption has become so pervasive that people truly do not “see” it anymore. They mouth it out of sheer habit. Like the devil or Satan, they refer to corruption because something has to be held responsible for our recurring issues. When Nigerians use the term “corruption” like a formula to diagnose every one of Nigeria’s multiple problems, they mean more than the ethical charge of it. Corruption in Nigeria has a spiritual connotation; something is rotten in the Nigerian state and its putrid traces seep out of our many broken systems.

What makes Amaechi’s case funny is not just his words but also the context in which they were spoken. He spoke before a group of people vested with powers to perform the noble task of making the laws for the rest of us. That declaration of his virtue ought to resonate meaningfully through those hallowed chambers but alas, it sounded hollow, like seeds sown on stony minds. The lawmakers ought to have questioned him more vigorously about his claim but could they have confronted him without betraying their flaws in the process?

At some point, I wondered how possible it is to be a politician in Nigeria with all her loose systems and not be corrupt, and never take a bribe. Perhaps, the secret is in the methods. I imagine politicians never call a bribe a bribe. It does not matter if one calls things that are as though they are not, permit the corruption of the Bible passage. A bribe by any other name shall still smell sweet. Perhaps, to not be corrupt in Nigeria, one can easily break down what has now been reduced to mere symbolism, the barriers between what belongs to the state and what belongs to the individual.

At best, like Louis XIV, declare “I am the state!” and that should remove the demarcation between what is yours and what is the state’s. That way, if you put a fistful of crisp dollars in your pocket, you owe no one an explanation for how it got there. Like the Second Republic Kano State governor, Barkin Zuwo, would have said, it is government money in government house. If you buy a private jet for a mere N7bn and your detractors exaggerate and add a couple more billions to your expense, you can publicly respond to their inanity by saying what your jet truly costs. Yes, you can do this without bothering about the irony nor be weighed down by any moral scruples.

Even more importantly, you will not have to worry about any toothless, biteless and nerveless agency called the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission. Not that they will come for you anyway (until you fall on the wrong side of politics) but because even if they do, it will go nowhere. A Nigerian politician’s street creed is hardly complete without a visit to the EFCC. It is all posturing.

Amaechi’s words, when asked about corruption were telling. He said, “Corruption is very difficult to define. If you’re a public officer and you don’t take bribes — I have never taken a bribe in my life — but if they send a girl to you and you sleep with the girl and do that favour, you’re corrupt.”

This is another problem with his rhetorical overdrive: lack of respect for either the audience both in the chamber and million others watching the live transmission. A man who wants to be considered for public office stands before lawmakers and of all examples possible in the universe, he chooses to illustrate corruption by using sex as a currency of transaction among his coterie of male politicians! If he could not be politically correct, he could at least be respectful.

Even more amazing is how nobody took up or has taken up Amaechi on his audacious statement. No media house could fact-check him and none of his adversaries, for all their noise, produced any evidentiary counter to his statement. If an Oyinbo politician ever said that, s/he would be heavily scrutinised. Rather, what we were gifted in Nigeria were a few feeble responses saying since the man had not been charged for any crime, he could be telling the truth.

 

We know that he is unlikely to ever be charged with anything even if he was caught red-handed in sin. In Nigeria, corruption probes are a mere media circus designed to distract Nigerians from the boredom of sameness of governance. Nobody ever admits to corruption and hardly anyone is found guilty. When people are charged with corruption, it is hardly in deference to the law but because of their politics.

Amaechi says he cannot define corruption because it is “very difficult” but in the past he has had no qualms saying he, like other politicians, steals public funds because Nigerians do not stone him. Amaechi reminds one of the proverbial bird that passionately detests faeces but still feeds on maggots. He hates corruption but then since Nigerians are too docile to stone him, he feeds off its proceeds.

Remind me again, dear Nigerians, why did we ridicule former President Goodluck Jonathan for his statement, “stealing is not corruption”?