TWO DECADES OF NIGERIA’S INSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORKS IN ANTI-CORRUPTION CRUSADE: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF SUCCESSIVE GOVERNMENTS (1999-2020)

ABSTRACT

One of the greatest crimes against humanity that is particularly subversive of the economic and social life of a developing society like Nigeria is corruption. It has been two decades when Nigeria returned to democratic system of government in1999 and almost the same time when institutional fight against corruption started. Using systems theory as the framework, the purpose of this paperwas toassess the efforts of institutional frameworks in anti-corruption crusade in the two decades of Nigeria’s democratic rule by the successive governments. The paper followed comparative approach and used content analysis of secondary data to assess the effectiveness of these institutional frameworks with particular focus on the achievements and challenges of successive administrations in Nigeria in relation with its global and regional positions between 1999 and 2020.The major finding among others is that the institutional frameworks on anti-graft war had recorded less achievements and more failures rather than success despite the rapt attention given to the issue by each successive government in the last two decades. Based on the above findings, the paper concluded that the country’s fight against corruption as has being prosecuted by successive government is not gaining any achievement, instead the country is losing more grounds. The paper therefore, recommended among others, that there should be an improved inter-agency synergy; enactment of effective laws and adequate welfare for personnel, closure of implementation gap between anti-corruption legislations, practice and enforcement, and no corruption case should be left to linger for a long time; all should be promptly investigated and those found culpable should be punished.

Keywords: Corruption, Anti-Corruption, Institutional Frameworks &Successive Governments