The anti-corruption fight of the Muhammadu Buhari administration over the past year received a further dent on Tuesday, as Transparency International released its Corruption Perception Index, showing that not only did the country’s score stay at 27% in 2018 like in 2017, it ranked 33rd most corrupt nation in the globe.
It was however an improvement in ranking as the country moved from 148th position in 2017 to 144th, which made it Sub-Saharan Africa’s 18th most corrupt and Africa’s 19th on the index.
The index, first released in 1995, “ranks 180 countries and territories by their perceived levels of public sector corruption according to experts and business people, uses a scale of 0 to 100, where 0 is highly corrupt and 100 is very clean. More than two-thirds of countries score below 50 on this year’s CPI, with an average score of just 43.”
This is therefore interpreted to mean that the continued failure of most countries to significantly control corruption is contributing to a crisis in democracy around the world. While there are exceptions, the data shows that despite some progress, most countries are failing to make serious inroads against corruption.
According to Transparency, the index highlights the “connection between corruption, inequality and weak democracy in 180 surveyed countries,” with Nigeria occupying the 144th position with Comoros, Guatemala, Kenya and Mauritania, coming behind Russia and Mexico, among others at 138.
The components used to compute the CPI are: Economist Intelligence Unit Country Ratings, where Nigeria scored 20; Varieties of Democracy Project, 25; PRS International Country Risk Gude, 24; and World Justice Project Rule of Law Index, 27. Its best score came in the World Bank CPIA at 35; followed by African Development Bank CPIA, 34; and Bertelsmann Foundation Transformation Index, 33; while Nigeria scored 22 in the Global Insight Country Risk Ratings; and 19 in World Economic Forum EOS.
These brought total score to 239, which when divided by the nine sources, equals 26.55% (approximately 27).
Nigeria’s best average score since the military era in 1996 (its worst ever at 6.9) was 28 in 2016.
This makes the fifth time in 22 years that the country is scored 27, bringing its average score for the entire period to 20.7%.
Denmark remains the most transparent in the world, even when its score stagnated at 88, as the previous year, but down two and three points down respectively from 90 in 2016 and 91 in 2015; New Zealand scored 87, also down from 89, 90 and 91 in 2017, 2016 and 2015; while Finland came third, scoring 85 just like 2017; down from 89 and 90 in 2016 and 2015. Singapore also came third, scoring 85, returning to its four-year best in 2015, improving from 84 in 2017 and 2016; just as Sweden and Switzerland on the third position.
On the top 20 were also: Norway, Netherlands, Canada, Luxembourg, Germany, United Kingdom; Australia, Austria, Hong Kong, Iceland, Belgium, Estonia, Ireland and Japan.
France missed the top rank, after despite its improved score of 72, up from 70, 69 and 70 in the previous three years; the U.S however fell for the third consecutive year and five points from its score of 76 in 2015 to 71.
“The low score comes at a time when the US is experiencing threats to its system of checks and balances as well as an erosion of ethical norms at the highest levels of power,” TI said in the report.
United Arab Emirates dropped one point from 71 in 2017; occupying the 23rd position just like Uruguay, which lost four points from 74 in 2015.
The bottom countries on the table are: Somalia, with a score of 10; Syria, 13; South Sudan, 13; Yemen, 14; just as North Korea; Sudan, 16; like Guinea Bissau and Equatoria Guinea and Afghanistan; while Libya scored 17%, same as Burundi; which was slightly better than Nigeria’s fellow oil producing nation- Venezuela with a score of 18.
