Bush Urged to Condemn Nigerian Corruption
By DULUE MBACHU
Associated Press Writer
July 11, 2003, 4:34 PM EDT
LAGOS, Nigeria -- Yetunde Ogunwa, a 45-year-old mother of five, lives
without water or electricity in a dilapidated house next to mountains of
garbage in Lagos, Nigeria's vast seaside commercial capital.
Despite the country's massive oil wealth, Nigeria's citizens have grown
steadily poorer and its cities more violent in the four years since
military rule gave way to democracy.
So as the United States turns to Nigeria to help lessen its dependence
on Middle East oil, pressure is mounting for President Bush to take a
stand against rampant corruption in the West African country.
"If only they would let him see how we live, he might take pity and help
us," Ogunwa lamented ahead of Bush's arrival Friday in Nigeria at the
end of a five-nation tour of sub-Saharan Africa.
Nigeria, a regional powerhouse and Africa's most populous nation, is a
land of contradictions.
Billionaires and beggars, law-abiding citizens and con men rub shoulders
in cities where power and water services are still among the worst on
the continent. Violent crime is rife, and more than 10,000 people have
been killed in ethnic, political and religious bloodletting since
President Olusegun Obasanjo was elected in 1999.
Underlying many of the problems is widespread graft. A World Bank study
on public expenditure in Nigeria showed as much as 70 percent of
government funds were frittered away as patronage through over-inflated
contracts between 1970 and 1992 -- leaving the country with worse social
indicators than it had at independence from Britain in 1960.
More than two-thirds of Nigeria's 126 million people survive on less
than one dollar a day.
Widespread poverty spawned a generation of drug dealers and organized
criminal gangs with a global reach long enough to prompt the United
States to establish a Secret Service office in Lagos.
When Obasanjo was elected, he promised to end the brutality and
corruption that characterized 15 years of military rule and quickly set
up a body charged with investigating and punishing those guilty of
graft.
Four years later, the government has failed to secure a single
corruption conviction against officials or civil servants. Government
coffers continue to be pilfered, while roads, schools and clinics are
left to crumble and decay.
Oil multinationals, pumping more than 2 million barrels a day from
Nigeria's southern swamps, face growing questions here about whether
they are fueling the culture of corruption. American companies Exxon
Mobil Corp. and ChevronTexaco together account for more than one-third
of production.
The U.S. oil services giant Halliburton caused a stir recently when it
filed documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission admitting a
Nigerian subsidiary paid $2.4 million in bribes to a Nigerian official
in exchange for tax exemptions.
Obasanjo has ordered an investigation into the deal.
Warring ethnic groups in the oil-rich Niger Delta region accuse oil
companies of colluding with Nigeria's government to deprive impoverished
residents of profits from the area's massive oil wealth. Activists --
and thugs -- frequently target the companies with sabotage, kidnappings
and other attacks in a bid to extort payoffs.
Companies counter that they spend millions of dollars a year on
community development.
"What we need from Bush is to ... clean up our environment and allow us
to control our God-given wealth," said activist Itioghor Tortorbor.
International human rights groups have launched a "Publish What You Pay"
campaign calling on oil multinationals to disclose all payments to the
government. Oil companies, which say they work to the same standards
here as in any other country, have embraced the initiative.
The scheme as also won the support of British Prime Minister Tony Blair,
and activists are urging Bush to endorse it too.
U.S. Embassy officials said the violence in the Niger Delta would be on
the agenda when Bush meets with Obasanjo in Abuja on Saturday. But Bush
has said little on the allegations of corruption in the oil industry.
"Bush should push the Nigerians to break the web of entrenched
corruption and vested interests, and move into a more open economy where
oil money is used to uplift people instead of uplifting elites," said
Herman Cohen, who served as U.S. assistant secretary of state for
African affairs under President Clinton. "That's a tough message he
should take to Nigeria."
Copyright © 2003, The Associated Press
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