RELIGIOUS & TRADITIONAL INSTITUTIONS JOIN ANEEJ TO BATTLE CORRUPTION
16th September 2018.
Benin City, Nigeria…The Africa Network for Environment & Economic Justice, ANEEJ, has perfected plans to engage religious and traditional institutions and leaders to change social norms and behaviour that promote and sustain corruption.
In a statement, ANEEJ executive director, the Rev David Ugolor said that the decision to engage key religious and traditional institutions in the anti-corruption campaign is a reflection of the fact that there are tenets in Christian, Islamic and Orthodox practices that condemn corruption and prescribe sanctions for dipping of hands in the public purse.
‘Nigerians are tired of corruption. Even though a number of institutions or agencies and laws exist to deal with the same issue, people have been arrested, tried and jailed for corruption over time, yet the problem remains unsolved. Therefore, in enlisting the religious and traditional institutions in the fight against corruption, we realize that these institutions have wide audience and reach, apparently, because millions of Nigerians listen to and obey them because of their status as representatives of God and the voices of their communities. They have a big role to play as catalysts of behaviour change in the anti-corruption campaign’, the Rev Ugolor said in the statement.
To this end, ANEEJ has designed a workshop to hold in Asaba Delta State on 17th September 2018 to examine the role religious and traditional institutions can play in bringing about change in certain norms and behaviors that promote corruption in Nigeria.
‘If these roles are properly identified and acted upon alongside the implementation of existing approaches and laws, I can assure you that corruption will be a thing of the past in Nigeria’, the Rev Ugolor added.
The event is being held as part of the implementation of the “Monitoring of Recovered Assets in Nigeria through Transparency and Accountability (MANTRA) project which ANEEJ is implementing with support from the UKAID under the Anti-Corruption in Nigeria.