A Chatham House report launched yesterday in Abuja has estimated
that at least $480 billion was stolen by corrupt officials between 1960
and 2004.Chatham House, the Royal Institute of International Affairs, is
an independent policy institute based in London.
The report, titled “Collective Action on Corruption in Nigeria, a
Social Norms Approach to Connecting Societies and Institutions,” said
that close to $400 billion was stolen from Nigeria’s public accounts
from 1960 to 1999. It added that between 2005 and 2014, $182 billion was
lost through illicit financial flows from the country.
This stolen commonwealth, the report observed, represents the
investment gaps in building and equipping modern hospitals to reduce
Nigeria’s exceptionally high maternal mortality rates estimated at two
out of every 10 global maternal deaths.
British Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr. Paul Awkright, noted that
corruption is bad for people and business. “Corruption fuels inequality,
holds back development and it is a threat to national development of
countries,” he said.
Awkright, who disclosed that Nigeria and Britain are making progress in
tackling corruption, expressed delight that the current administration
of President Muhammadu Buhari has made fight against corruption a key
action of the government.
He noted that the study provides insight into why people engage in or
refrain from corruption and cautioned that tough talk and fear-based
messaging alone cannot address corruption.
The study, coauthored by Dr. Leena Koni Hoffman, an associate fellow
of the Africa programme at Chatham House and Raj Navanit Patel, a
consultant at the University of Pennsylvania and a Ph.D. candidate in
the department of Philosophy, suggested policy approaches to dealing
with corruption and offered methods of integrating behavioural insights
into anti-corruption strategies.
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