Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye
Frank Vogl is the co-founder of two leading international non-governmental organizations that are fighting corruption – Transparency International and the Partnership for Transparency Fund. Transparency International (TI), the global anti-corruption watchdog has again ranked Nigeria low in its 2017 Corruption Perception Index (CPI) released recently.
The latest ranking has Nigeria in the 148th position out of 180. The country, according to the CPI, scored 28 out of 100, a figure lower than the average in sub-Saharan Africa. CPI score relates to perceptions of the degree of corruption as experienced by business people and analysts, which ranges between 100 (highly clean) and zero (highly corrupt).
Vogl in this interview on the sidelines of the 2018 Spring Meetings in Washington DC provided answers to some of the vexed issues that trailed that report.
Transparency International (TI) rating is based on perception, how much of this is real?
It is a very good question because we use 14 different independent polling organizations that have taken their own polls. And what we do is aggregate those polls to produce a number, which is a perception number out of 100. And we do this for 168 countries and that is where the ranking comes in. Corruption takes many forms and when you have a number that should cover everything, the abuse of grand corruption right down to petty corruption, you have very general number. But we have another study which we call the African Barometer, where we look at much more detail about low level corruption and we found out that in many countries in sub-Saharan Africa, ordinary people feel that the greatest corruption they face in their daily lives is from the police. And our corruption perception index will not capture that grandeur le pax because it’s just a big number. And you see that when you look at Nigeria’s rating, quite a number of other countries are immediately below and immediately above and from year to the next second shift. But we have always looked at and I hope Nigerians do, as a sort of wake up call, because I don’t think anybody will say that Nigeria doesn’t have a corruption problem. But how much? People will differ. But what greatly concerns me and that is why I will like to invite you to look at our website at the African Barometer, is how corruption impacts the poorest. So, I think it is important that we go beyond just the corruption index number that‘s a wake up call to looking at how corruption robs people of their personal dignity. And it is so widespread in Nigeria, I am afraid as well as it is in many other countries. You know, I wrote a book many years ago about fighting corruption and in the book I quoted Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala because she told a story of a young woman, who had come from a very, very poor home to a university. Now at university, her professor asked her to pay and said if you don’t pay me money I won’t let you pass your exams. And then she said I have no money and then he asked her for sex. We call that sextortion. So, she left university and the hopes of her and her family were all gone. This is a crime against humanity and I don’t think the world understands enough about the abuse of individual’s dignity that is caused by the worse kind of corruption. And I‘ll rather look at the one person than look at the bigger index.
One of the reactions back home was that this ranking is stage-managed, can perception be stage-managed?
No, it’s not. We have so many complaints about the index that it can’t be stage-managed. It really isn’t. I was involved in the very first index in 1995, so we have tried many, many years to improve on it, to strengthen the methodology, make it more comprehensible from one year to the next. We are very confident about the methodology, but it is just a snapshot in time like all polls. People need to understand that it is a poll of polls, it is not just Transparency International going on polls. The most encouraging part is that we get so much criticism that it sparks discussion in countries, a discussion that offends doesn’t take place otherwise. And when you get very authoritarian government finding out that members of their parliament are even complaining and say to the government, you have got to go to Berlin to the Head of Transparency International and complain about the poll, then for the first time the parliament is having a discussion about corruption and that is good. But I am very confident about the methodology.
Nigeria’s ranking dropped even though many thought President Buhari was doing well in his fight against corruption. Why?
I don’t know. And I say that because perception of corruption when you ask very large number of different people from foreign businessmen to the citizens of the country, very slowly the most complaint you will usually get is that a country saying we have just passed a new law against corruption, we have just put a former president in prison, why has our rating not gone up? And we say you know this kind of index moves very slowly and actually you know, that is a good thing because you know the number of countries that have made progress and then got back on it again unfortunately, is far too often. And if you take Nigeria, there are too many former leaders who when they are running for elections say they are going to do something about corruption and when they get into office, they don’t do so much. So expectations and realities take time to digest and that is why sometimes the index goes down a bit. But don’t forget that sometimes the index and the ranking go down because other countries have done better.
How can Nigeria improve given the difficult task of fighting corruption in the country?
It starts with citizens. Democracy exists in Nigeria. You have a free press, a very cantankerous press, very lively press. It starts with citizens, citizens must realize that they cannot rely on their leaders to clean up the mess, citizens must take action, they must fully participate in the electoral system to see that good and honest people get elected. They must go to the streets and campaign when they see corruption, they must make their voices heard. Technical experts in Nigeria know what needs to be done but the political will is not there. They are not doing enough.
There are insinuations that Nigeria’s ranking might have been influenced by the critics of government such as Obasanjo and Oby Ezekwesili. How true is this?
No, no. They really have nothing to do with the index at all. We have a very good research department in Berlin. You cannot imagine how many people will like to influence the index. And we have taken a lot of steps because essentially, Transparency International is the leading global organization against corruption. If it was ever thought that we ourselves will be corrupt, our whole endeavour will be gone. Our reputation, our creditability will be gone. We are very, very sensitive to that because we operate in a hundred countries, which means that thousands of people of great courage are working in very difficult countries to make a difference against corruption. We can’t let them down by having our reputation tarnished.