Tackling judicial bribery and procurement fraud in Nigeria: How harnessing public disapproval can enable collective action against corruption

Abstract

Nigeria’s corruption challenges are central to the country’s struggles with insecurity, inequality and inadequate provision of public goods and services. Tackling corrupt activities is made more difficult by their interdependence. The misappropriation of public funds in procurement and contracting processes, which continues to erode Nigeria’s already limited public spending capacity, is further enabled by a weak and compromised judicial system. While Nigeria has taken some steps to reform its judiciary and procurement sector, efforts have focused primarily on establishing legislative structures and formal rules. Further consideration needs to be given to informal social dynamics that may enable and perpetuate corruption. This research paper explores the results of the third national household survey conducted under the Chatham House Africa Programme’s Social Norms and Accountable Governance (SNAG) project. For this survey, citizens across Nigeria were asked about their beliefs concerning judicial and procurement corruption. A large majority of survey respondents considered judicial bribery, contract inflation and the misappropriation of public funds by private contractors to be unacceptable, but also saw them as both common and commonly accepted. Respondents often underestimated the extent to which others in their community disapproved of such practices. These insights suggest that there are openings for collective action against corruption in Nigeria’s procurement sector and judiciary. The survey findings also highlight that Nigerians have faith in the ability of anti-corruption institutions to take steps towards accountability. The paper offers a series of recommendations aimed at promoting sensitive and context-specific anti-corruption interventions, and encouraging community mobilization against corrupt behaviours.