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CORRUPTION IN NIGERIA: PERCEIVED CHALLENGES OF THE ECONOMIC AND FINANCIAL CRIMES COMMISSION (EFCC) IN THE FOURTH REPUBLIC
ABSTRACT
Although corruption in Nigeria is often traced to the pre-colonial era, the trend became exacerbated during the ‘corrective’ military regimes, beginning from the mid 1980s. Since then to date, corruption has sustained in the Nigerian polity, steadily permeated the walls of subsequent governments and negatively impacted on all facets of the economy. Paradoxically, while successive administrations, researchers, non-governmental organizations (local and foreign), and many other stake holders have instituted various mechanisms and initiatives aimed at stemming the tide of corruption in Nigeria, the scenario continues to assume a deplorable state by the day; a condition which has already caused devastation of huge proportion and is ready to wreck further havoc if left unaddressed. Therefore, drawing quantitative data from one hundred and eleven (111) staff of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (Port Harcourt Zonal Office), this paper adopted the cross sectional survey design to explore corruptionrelated challenges faced by EFCC in Nigeria’s fourth republic. Attempts to account for the prevalence of corruption in Nigeria placed this study within the ambits of Alfred Bandura’s Observational Learning theory. The study was directed by three research questions and insights gleaned from frequency counts and percentages confirmed that the immunity clause is a major impediment to EFCC’s fight against corruption in Nigeria. Results also indicated that high poverty rate in Nigeria impact negatively on EFCC’s fight against corruption. Based on these findings and cognizant of the various dimensions of abuse of the constitution perpetuated by Nigerian politicians and public servants, this paper among other things, throws it weight behind the recent call for the review of the 1999 constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria with the specific import of amending section 308 (1).
Keywords: Immunity Clause, Bribery, Constitution, observational learning