By Adeleye Kunle
Godwin Onyeacholem and Chido Onumah
African Centre for Media and Information Literacy, AFRICMIL, will launch the Corruption Anonymous, CORA, whistleblowing platform at the Yar’Adua Centre in Abuja in collaboration with the Yar’Adua Foundation.
The CORA platform is a safe, civil society-driven public whistleblowing tool that allows citizens to anonymously report corruption and other forms of wrongdoing. The platform, developed in collaboration with AFRICMIL and the Yar’Adua Foundation, aims to strengthen the Nigerian government’s whistleblowing policy. We’ll get back to this.
It was an unprecedented dramatic exploit, an unforced disclosure from the most unlikely of sources. The Pandora’s box, which had been well preserved for decades, was prised open inside the court at the apex of courts, the presumed fortress of judicial rectitude and the last bastion of cryptic conservatism. With allegations of missing funds and gross incompetence, the stench was overpowering.
In the nearly 59-year history of Nigeria’s Supreme Court, this is the first time justices have gone public with a letter detailing the institution’s leadership’s iniquities. This is not in any way regrettable. On the contrary, it is a pleasant experience to observe people who frequently bask in the virtuous mantra of “only to be seen and not to be heard” now letting it all hang out in a somewhat unrestrained manner.
Some media colleagues have called the justice’s latest rendition “explosive.” They are correct. For once, instead of simply arriving in wig and gown and reveling in the mystique of their legendary tight lip, our Lordships defied the tide by speaking out. And the message was unequivocal.
But, in a broader sense, what the respected justices have done is nothing more than whistleblowing – a disclosure of long-standing wrongdoing in the Supreme Court that, if not addressed, could harm society’s well-being. To that extent, the disclosure, while primarily concerned with the welfare of individual justices, is ultimately in the public’s interest.
The revelation is due. What makes it appear otherwise or strange is that it came from an unexpected location and from unexpected people. This whistle was not blown from the bottom of the court, i.e. by gardeners, messengers, clerks, or middle-level officers and the like, who are normally associated with dissatisfaction with the system.
It came from the very top, from no less a group than the justices themselves – the true minders of the institution, whom most people would see as beneficiaries of a broken system – against their chief, who was only fortunate to be first among equals.
The justices were concerned that, despite an increase in the judiciary’s budgetary allocation, their legitimate entitlements were not paid. In other words, our Lordships are wondering, “Where did the money go?” They accused their boss of being part irresponsible and part derelict, charging that instead of granting their request for human and other material accessories that would improve their work, he would rather go junketing around the world with family members and personal staff.
Then came the clincher: “We demand to know what happened to our training funds, whether they were diverted or simply denied.” It is worth noting that the letter itself strongly suggests a lack of trust in Justice Tanko Muhammad, even if his colleagues had not painted him as an outright corrupt and blundering administrator. Coming from the judiciary, a stalwart of democratic sustainability, this rare act of whistleblowing is a most welcome development that deserves the applause of ardent supporters of good governance, whether in civil society, the public or private sector.
The justices had obviously begun to choke and had no choice but to vent in order to save themselves and, by extension, an important arm of government whose public perception has become increasingly bleak as it is routinely accused of pandering only to the interests of the wealthy and powerful.
This notion, right or wrong, is the source of the derisive term “cash-and-carry” judiciary. But, as is well known, without a strong, independent judiciary, democracy will continue to float on the whims of arbitrariness; yes, arbitrariness, which Justice Muhammad served throughout his tenure as Nigeria’s chief justice and which his colleagues finally moved to end. Top officials in other branches of government who are also dealing with fraud and other potentially harmful practices should follow the lead of the justices and make their complaints public. This is a positive step toward addressing society’s ills.
Amid rampant corruption that has decimated credible indices of human growth and effectively brought Nigeria to its knees, the Buhari administration realized that it would not make any meaningful progress in fighting corruption unless the people were brought into the fight as partners. So, just over a year after its inauguration, it considered a memo from the Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption, PACAC, an anti-corruption think-tank it established as part of its corruption-fighting strategy, which led to the implementation of the whistleblowing policy via executive order.
Buhari designated the Presidential Initiative on Continuous Audit, PICA, a unit within the Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget, and National Planning that will also be a legacy of his administration, as the administrators of the new policy instrument.
Although the policy has been lauded as one of the most effective of this administration’s anti-corruption strategies, it has remained just that: a policy. Without a doubt, the failure to graduate the policy to an effective law has understandably hampered interest in whistleblowing because people are afraid of being punished for blowing the whistle, which continues to manifest in varying degrees in many ministries, departments, and agencies.
Dr. Onumah is the Coordinator of the African Centre for Media and Information Literacy, AFRICMIL, and Onyeacholem is the Coordinator of the AFRICMIL whistleblowing project, Corruption Anonymous, CORA.
When Supreme Court Justices Become Whistleblowers originally appeared on Track News.
