THE Socio Economic Research & Development Centre (SERDEC), has advised governor Yahaya Bello of Kogi to ignore calls by his aides for litigation following the recent rating of the State as ”the most corrupt state in Nigeria” by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
Mr. Tijani Abdulkareem, the Executive Director of SERDEC, gave the advise in a press statement made available to newsmen on Friday in Lokoja.
Abdulkareem noted that such call or action could be misleading and interpreted as weaponising corruption, while advising the governor to seek collective action to end corruption in the state.
He stressed that the rating should not be seen as an indictment on the institution of government alone but also on the citizens and public officials that engaged in corruption incidence with reckless impunity within the state.
According to him, corruption is a heavy burden which the state needs to tackle as it comes in many guises: ranging from the prevalence of bribery incidence for public service delivery, illegal extortion by law enforcement officials, violence erupting from political corruption to misappropriation of public funds.
He, therefore, advised the govemor to put in place measures to tackle the heightened impunity, and enhance transparency and accountability through open govemment and spur citizens’ participation toward behavioral change in the fight against corruption.
”Corruption needs positive confrontation not litigation; when corruption prevails, development is threatened.
”Fighting corruption should be prioritized by the state govemment if it desires to achieve sustainable development; tackling corruption is a collective responsibility.
”Government should put in place mechanism to check the activity of public officials for example having citizen’s hotline for reporting coruption incidences,” he advised.
He further urged the state government to also support anti-corruption agencies within the state to carryout oversight and having an effective anti-corruption regulatory framework that checked the excesses of public officials.
