It seems that some people almost misread the earlier part of this article. Dishonesty is a worldwide phenomenon but it appears that it has grown so much in our country that it has taken over our reputation. It is not indigenous to Nigeria and I did not mean to say that. I am just getting concerned about the consequences on the country especially on a few honest people among us. Part of my concern is that dishonesty has cost us so much as a country. So many international businesses become cautious when it is time to deal with Nigeria. Can you see something as universally accessible as e-bay cannot operate in Nigeria? Do you know why? On the e-bay platform, the key factor is trust. If someone puts out an item for sale, a potential customer must trust that information available and use it to place a bid.
At the end, if one is successful, you are expected to pay and in return receive your item according to specification. Now, this is not to say that e-bay or similar online platforms are perfect, but to a great extent, you have to trust someone at the other end in order to deal. Such levels of trust are not available in Nigeria and so e-bay cannot operate there. Do you know how convenient it could have been for one to shop in a global supermarket from the convenience of one’s bedroom in Nigeria? Do you know the amount of jobs that will create and how it will decongest our traffic and make life easy? In exchange, we have the ‘yahoo yahoo’ boys who daily invade people’s privacy globally with badly written mails of one fraudulent offer or another.
In the last two weeks, I have discussed my concern on the issue of dishonesty with two of my friends. One is from Lesotho in Southern Africa, while the other is from Kenya in East Africa. Both of them have almost an identical impression of the perception that Nigerians cannot be trusted. We are not trusted by foreigners. Even within Nigeria, we do not trust ourselves. You can imagine that politicians who steal money from public resources in Nigeria prefer to invest them abroad. That is the difference between criminal politicians in Nigeria and those of them in Indonesia. In Nigeria, when corrupt people steal money, they prefer to hide them in tax havens or invest them in businesses outside the country. They end up creating jobs and opportunities for people in another country. That is part of the reason why our economy continues to plummet, and why poverty, unemployment and anger will continue to increase. In the case of Indonesia, it is very different. When the corrupt elite steal money, they keep them back in their country and invest them in industries and sectors that will create opportunities for Indonesians. The elite in both countries may be doing the same negative thing, but the scale of the impact in both countries is different and the reason has to do with trust.
A direct impact of low public trust among other things is that Nigeria has become the capital of money laundering in Africa, ranking seventh out of 20 largest exporters of illicit funds in the world. According to the Global Financial Integrity, a Washington DC-based organisation, Nigeria lost $165bn between 1970 and 2008. Experts who have studied the impact on low trust and corruption and prosperity have identified what is known as social capital as a possible indicator to measure how much trust people have on themselves and others. Social trust is a belief in the honesty, integrity and reliability of others – a “faith in people.” The norms that constitute social capital can range from a norm of reciprocity between two friends, all the way up to complex and elaborately articulated norms in religious doctrines. That does not mean that religion is a pre-requisite for the development of social trust, but it has been found to be relevant in terms of constructing and enhancing it.
It is believed that citizens of countries such as Sweden, Norway and Denmark that have high levels of social trust on one another also have a manifestly low level of corruption. They are said to have high propensity for volunteering, especially at the non-governmental level. Even though there have not been a comprehensive measure of social capital in Nigeria, one can safely assume that Nigerians actively mingle with one another at the non-governmental level. We belong to social clubs, we belong to youth groups, and there are many women organisations. Even many secret societies do exist to offer some level of cooperation and networking with one another as well as some service to their communities.In the past 20 years or so, NGO activities have proliferated to almost every nook and cranny in the country. How come all of these levels of networking have not led to the amount of social capital that will be able to lead to an improvement in the level of trust that lead to a considerable reduction in the level of corruption?
That is an important conversation that should worry both citizens and public officials in Nigeria. The low level of inter-communal trust may be the tragedy of our nation. Often times in public service, one will notice the competition for superiority of one ethnic group against the other. Even in politics. Out of greed or naivety, public officials have created policies that have worsened inter-communal trust and weakened national cohesion over the years such as political office zoning, federal character, and power rotation. These are the building blocks upon which the level of dishonesty that have grown at all levels in the country rests on. In between ethnic groups and within them. In between religions and within them, the dubious fragmentation due to lack of trust continues to increase.
Many questions about corruption, institutional failure, even religious conflict and extremism may be resolved if someone can rigorously understand the trend of social trust in Nigeria. What can be done for Nigerians to start trusting one another and believing that others too can be trusted? How do we take this to the international level and re-engineer our reputation as a country of trustworthy people? The role of those at the top in this struggle is crucial, but it is a national assignment that should involve all stakeholders at all levels. Historians have documented that the high level of dishonesty and high level of corruption that now exists in Nigeria once existed in countries like Sweden, Norway and Denmark. Today, the case of these countries is improved and their citizens and economies are better off for it. We can do the same for Nigeria and it can only happen through a collective effort. Unless we resolve these questions, all other efforts to transformation and national development should be considered dead on arrival.
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