A former chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, Attahiru Jega, has given reasons why Nigerians are afraid of providing information on whistleblower policy.
Delivering a paper on Tuesday at a zonal conference on Whistle Blower Policy in Nigeria for the Northwest Zone in Kano, Mr Jega said fear and lack of legal protection are militating against the workability of the policy.
The conference, organised by the Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning, has a theme as, ‘Implementation of the Whistle Blower Policy in Nigeria: Issues, Challenges and Way Forward.
He said, “fear and lack of legal protection and legal backing to get the reward are disincentives for people to volunteer information under the policy.”
Mr Jega, a former vice-chancellor at Bayero University, Kano also identified lack of legal framework as one of the major factors debilitating the efficacy of the country’s whistleblower policy.
He said the fact that it has taken over five years to have a legal framework for the policy shows “our national inertia to fighting corruption”, adding that it will require a lot of effort to get the National Assembly to pass the bill.
“Fear and lack of legal protection and legal backing to get the reward are disincentives for people to volunteer information under the policy,” he noted.
Mr Jega added that the policy itself which is a very laudable one needs to be properly contextualized for Nigerians to get the benefits attached to it, adding that because it is a federal policy, implementation at state and local levels are very constrained.
Aside from ensuring the speedy passage of a legal framework, Mr Jega made several recommendations to help speed up the efficacy of the policy, among which he said should be a continual review, revision, updating and improvement of the policy while drawing appropriate lessons from global best practices.
He also recommended that opportunities should be created for conspirators and accomplices to gather the courage to “spill out” against co-criminals, while the framework itself be expanded to be applicable to states and local governments.
He said corruption is so deep-rooted in the country’s political economy that mere good intentions or sloganeering cannot uproot it.
“It is not clear of what kind of information gives you 2.5% or 5% reward which makes it more arbitrary. Transparency in this regard can be very useful in the efficacy of the implementation of the policy,” he said.
