From rules to standards: Civil society contestations, EITI and the missing link to accountability in Nigeria: Interview with Faith Nwadishi

Abstract

Since her early role as a member and coordinator of the Publish What You Pay (PWYP) coalition in Nigeria, Faith Nwadishi has participated at the highest levels of EITI leadership at the national, continental and global levels as a representative of civil society organizations. In this discussion with Isaac 'Asume' Osuoka in February 2020, Nwadishi reflects on the factors and forces that continue to shape NEITI and how the role of Nigerian civil society organizations has contributed to its framing and implementation. Describing ongoing North-South tensions and compromises, Nwadishi recounts how the NEITI has utilized, contested and helped further the EITI's global agenda. Here, the EITI is shown to be evolving in response to internal contestations and external criticism, reflected in the expansion of the EITI agenda from a core concern on financial payments between companies and governments to the accommodation of environmental reporting in the 2019 EITI Standard. However, other concerns such as human rights practices of companies and government in sites of extraction remain disputed in a global EITI regime where Northern political and corporate forces remain dominant.