Dogara: Only strong institutions can fight corruption

The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Yakubu Dogara, has said
that unless and until strong institutions are built and strengthened,
Nigeria may end up punishing corruption but not fighting corruption.
He spoke on Monday at the launch of a book “Antidotes for Corruption” –
written by Senator Dino Melaye – in Abuja, where he opined that only
strong institutions can fight corruption in the country.
He said for the war against corruption to succeed, there must be
institutional reforms that will help put in place measures which will make
it near impossible for people to engage in corrupt acts.
To him, corruption as a disease must be treated from its roots and not
just the symptoms, and he argued that it is the moral responsibility of
all men and women of good will to fight corruption because every
individual pays the price of corruption in the society.
“As a country, we ran into a situation where corruption was becoming the
norm, there was this moral cult that we had created that celebrated
corruption,” the speaker stated.
According to him, “the motivation was always there for corruption, but now
what is important is not just fighting the old corrupt system. Really, if
we must make progress, our focus should be to replace the old order that
was corrupt with a new order that makes corruption near impossible to take
place.”
Talking about Senator Melaye, Dogara said he won’t be surprised  by the
avalanche of criticism that may follow this because “Dino himself is a
combination of so many things. He is highly opinionated, often pugnatious.
So, obviously, he will be a magnet for opinionated criticism as well, he
will not escape that.”
To drive home his point, the Speaker said: “Corruption, for those who are
farmers, is like a tree that grows vigorously. If you end up pruning the
trees and not attacking the roots, there is no way you will deal with that
thing.”
“So, when those who celebrate the successes of the fight against
corruption in terms of the high profile investigation, high profile
prosecution and even detention, they are missing the point because that is
dealing with the symptoms of corruption. That is punishing corruption. But
how are we developing remedies that we can apply to ensure that the tree
dies?”
“Recently, in the labour community, we went for May Day and some of us
were nearly held hostage. You can’t blame the workers. While they were
agitating for their rights, agitating for minimum wage, some of us are
talking about living wage. You see, the workers control, perhaps, about 96
percent of the budget. In the National Assembly, we have about 92 percent,
judiciary and the rest. So, if you don’t make the environment conducive
for those who administer this money not to want to be corrupt, you will
end up jailing people.”