So much noise has been made, much of it emotional outbursts, about the incarceration of James Ibori, the former Governor of Delta state in the United Kingdom after he pleaded guilty to corruption and money laundering charges. The saga started after he fled Nigeria to Dubai following a political witch hunt by President Goodluck Jonathan whom he had not supported to become president. But his shadows caught up with him in Dubai where he was arrested after the British government filed charges against him and requested his extradition to Britain. After a protracted court case, he was eventually extradited to Britain where he has been slammed with a 13 year jail term.
So much noise has been made, much of it emotional outbursts, about the incarceration of James Ibori, the former Governor of Delta state in the United Kingdom after he pleaded guilty to corruption and money laundering charges. The saga started after he fled Nigeria to Dubai following a political witch hunt by President Goodluck Jonathan whom he had not supported to become president. But his shadows caught up with him in Dubai where he was arrested after the British government filed charges against him and requested his extradition to Britain. After a protracted court case, he was eventually extradited to Britain where he has been slammed with a 13 year jail term.
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During the trial, it emerged that James Ibori had been previously convicted in Britain for shop lifting and credit card fraud before he found his way to Nigeria and emerged a Governor where his already well horned stealing skills was put to good use in looting and vandalising Delta state. Ironically, James Ibori had initially been twice cleared of cases against him in which he was accused of being an ex-convict in Nigeria on a charge of stealing building materials and on all corruption charges, the latter by Justice Marcel Awokulehin in a nation where the judiciary like everything else is for sale. His guilty plea and conviction in England has revealed the extent of corruption and rot in Nigeria’s cash and carry judiciary.
But the question now arises; how did James Ibori, a career criminal become a candidate and a governor in Nigeria? What kind of a nation or system throws up criminals as leaders? James Ibori’s spectacular journey from a career in crime into the corridors of power is the same as the story of Nigeria, a nation that has since become the most corrupt in the world. But Nigeria was not always synonymous with corruption. Prior to and during the early years of the first republic, Nigeria was still in a state of innocence. The few incidents, investigations and enquiries such as the ‘Foster Sutton tribunal’ and the ‘Coker Commission of enquiry’ amongst others that was then initiated against some political leaders had more to do with a conflict of interest and procedural breaches than off actual looting.
The only major incidence of corruption in the first republic was the election rigging saga in the West in 1964 which led to sustained violence within the region (wetie) and subsequently led to the January 1966 coup. But even at that, Nigeria in the first republic still remained free of deliberate and organized looting of public funds. With the arrival of the military in the aftermath of the January 1966 coup, corruption commenced its slight but subtle accent. Reports of money missing from the petroleum ministry and cement import scams were rife. Several permanent secretaries were sacked on corruption charges. However, corruption still remained at appreciably low levels until the departure of the military and the commencement of the second republic in 1979.
The second republic marked a significant departure from the hitherto low levels of corruption. Under President Shehu Shagari, large scale corruption was birthed with import licence scams, rice importation scams, contractor scams amongst others. The poster-child and prominent fugitive of the second republic, Alhaji Umaru Dikko reportedly stole in excess of 2 billion naira, consequently birthing the era of the ‘billion naira loot’ which has since become the norm. Massive rigging of elections and thuggery was also a fixture of the second republic.
Babangidization: Ibrahim Babangida’s Institutionalization of Corruption
The ‘Babangidization’ of Nigeria is the final act of institutionalization of corruption from 1985 by General Ibrahim Babangida. Preceding regimes had different levels of corruption, but none was as consolidated, malignant and institutionalized as the Ibrahim Babangida era. From 1985 when General Ibrahim Babangida seized power, he made it clear in no unmistakable terms that his government was all about ‘settlement’. Under that ignoble system, all those who supported or stood in opposition to his regime were settled in cash or kind. Government contracts, ministries, boards, parastatals and other top government positions officially became a means of ‘settlement’, and thus began the final decline and collapse of basic infrastructure such as roads, pipe borne water, hospitals, schools and institutions such as Nigeria airways, NITEL, NIPOST, NEPA, Refineries, Delta steel complex, Ajaokuta steel complex, Benue Cement, Nigeria airports authority etc. All those appointed to head these institutions under Babangida’s “settlement system” went there with the sole mission to loot.
Apart from government contracts and appointments premised on ‘settlement’ Babangida also deliberately created and facilitated many outlets of corruption. He licensed banks, finance houses and mortgage firms with scant regulations that literarily became hotspots of fraud. The ‘failed banks 419’ whereby banks and finance houses amassed deposits from the public, declares failure and flees with depositors funds became the norm in the banking industry. Advance fee fraud (419) with the use of government offices through active collusion by government officials became another norm. The Nigerian police force hitherto discreet in roadside extortion, began a new era of open and public extortion without any fear or constraints. A $12 billion oil windfall during the gulf war disappeared and was never accounted for. International corruption watchdogs listed Nigeria for the first time as the most corrupt country in the whole wide world during Babangida’s regime. Babangida thus singularly symbolises and represents Nigeria’s corruption.
The monumental institutionalization of corruption during the infamous Babangida era carried on into the General Sanni Abacha and General Abdulsalami Abubakar Regimes. By the time the trio left power and the democratic experiment began in 1999, Nigeria had been nurtured and indoctrinated into a system of institutionalized corruption that touched every facet of life for an unbroken period of 14 years from 1985 to 1999. James Ibori is thus a child and product of the ‘Babangidization’ of Nigeria and its attendant institutionalized corruption. Ibori could never have emerged or even become a candidate in a normal nation. Ibori as a candidate, governor and leader was possible because in the aftermath of the massive cancer of corruption with which Babangida afflicted Nigeria, the space for leadership in Nigeria was open only to criminals and therein lies the predicament where from local government councillors to Aso rock, Nigeria is ruled by criminals engaged in nothing else but massive looting. The Ibori phenomena should therefore be better understood and reconciled against the backdrop of the nation and system that produced him.
Lawrence Chinedu Nwobu
Email: [email protected]
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