By Chimezie Godfrey
The Independent Corrupt Practice and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) has criticized the criteria used by the Transparency International (TI) in arriving at its yearly Corruption Perception Index (CPI).
In his opening remark, the ICPC Chairman, Professor Bolaji Owasanoye made the criticism known during a two-day capacity building training organized by the Commission, to improve journalists’ capacity in reporting its anti-corruption efforts.
Owasanoye stressed that the TI’s reports paints a misleading picture of corruption in Nigeria, and by extension other poor nations.
He disclosed that a lot of countries especially developing countries were beginning to interrogate the credibility of TI’s reports.
The ICPC Chairman challenges TI on why its reports ranks countries that are victims of corruption poorer than countries that are the recipients of the proceeds of corruption
He said,”We have taken enough time to study it in the areas where criticisms were fair and we needed to adjust and the areas where it simply ignored the realities of the anti-corruption efforts from a developing country perspective and of course from the point of view of the international political economy.
“Some of you might have noticed that this year TI’s release did not have as much grounding or impact, and this is not a Nigerian phenomenon, a lot of countries especially developing countries are beginning to interrogate TI’s reports as to why the countries that are victims of corruption always rank poorer than the countries that are the recipients of the proceeds of corruption and we do not interrogate why this happens.”
He added,”Of course, we understand very clearly that in the developing countries like Nigeria, we have our challenges and we are not denying that, we are trying to deal with them in accordance with the law and within the local challenges that we face. But occasionally when there are prospects to make progress and advance the course there are frustrations that are encountered that are not immediately visible to observers.
“It is therefore time for us to begin to get involved in the narratives at least to present our own side of the story the way it ought to be presented so that their can be a balance of the information exchange and then of course the journalists can make whatever they want to make of it as best as they understand the situation.”
Recall that Transparency International Corruption Perception Index 2022 showed that Nigeria had moved up four places to 150th from 154th the previous year.
