Making Anticorruption Agencies More Effective in Nigeria: Towards Developing Country Specific Preventive Processes

Abstract

Musa Bala Zakari

The goal of any independent anticorruption agency, wherever it may be located, is to reduce or eliminate the incentives and opportunities that make corrupt activities alluring, thereby enhancing the effectiveness of the ruling government by eliminating elements within the system that may be damaging or corrupt. Achieving these aims requires ensuring that dedicated anticorruption agencies are provided with sufficient personnel and resources, and that additionally their organisational development needs are met. -This paper draws upon unique access to interviews with 20 senior officials employed in the dedicated anti-corruption agencies fighting corruption in Nigeria and access to 20 convicted case files relating to prosecutions by the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission (ICPC). The article asserts that for any programs to work, they must identify the nature and characteristics of corruption they are targeting and tackle the underlying, country-specific causes, or “drivers,” of dysfunctional governance as factors that cause corruption are country specific. Approaches that apply common policies and tools (that is, one-size-fits- all approaches) to countries in which acts of corruption and the quality of governance vary widely are likely to be unsuccessful. Information about local conditions can also help us understand what mechanism may work best and in which context.

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