The government has described the Transparency International (TI) Corruption Perception Index, which downgraded Nigeria in the rating for 2020, as inaccurate and not a true reflection of the strides made in its fight against corruption.
The agency revealed that the country dropped three places, scoring lower in a number of areas since 2019. The government said the report was filled with discrepancies and inaccurate data. Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, has said that TI had failed to make use of available data on the government’s various reforms and other preventive steps. He emphasised that the agency has been using incorrect indices to rate Nigeria in the last decade.
As part of the government’s clampdown on corruption, President Muhammadu Buhari suspended the previous Acting Economic and Financial Crimes Commission chief, Ibrahim Magu, in 2020, after allegations that he had diverted funds recovered by the agency into private pockets, charges Magu’s lawyer has denied.
Buhari appointed Abdulrasheed Bawa as the head of the country’s anti-graft body. Bawa will now take charge of a string of high-profile investigations, including into alleged wrongdoing by P&ID, a gas firm with a U.S.$10 billion arbitration ruling that the government is going to appeal in the UK. The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission was established in 2003 as a law enforcement agency to investigate financial crimes and other corruption cases.