Minister for Finance and Coordinator of the Economy,
Ngozi Okonjo Iweala was a guest on CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS programme on
Sunday where she acknowledged that there was corruption in Nigeria
but said that the fight against corruption must involve every
Nigerian...
"No one can fight corruption for
Nigerians except Nigerians. Everyone has to be committed from the top
to the bottom to fight it. In our country, we need to, coupled with – by
all means pursue those
who are corrupt, punish them, you know, make sure there’s no impunity.
But that has to be coupled with something which doesn’t get as much
attention, which is building institutions. It’s unglamorous; it’s work
that takes time, but we have to do it. We have to put it in place.” she
said.
The Minister was also taken up by the presenter on
Sanusi's suspension. He asked her why Sanusi was suspended after he
discovered that monies had been siphoned from the NNPC account of which
the Minister responded that Sanusi did not say monies were siphoned, he
said money was unaccounted for.
Full text of the Interview after the cut...
ZAKARIA: Listen in to our conversation. I began by asking her why the central banker was suspended for blowing the whistle.
NGOZI OKONJO-IWEALA, NIGERIAN FINANCE MINISTER:
I believe that when you find problems, you should also find solutions.
I think the problem began the first time when he said that the amount
that was – he never said it was stolen. He said it was unaccounted for,
was $49.8 billion.
And he wrote a letter to the president; he
called me a couple of days after, to say I’ve written this letter. And
my first reaction was, that’s not possible. We couldn’t be missing $50
billion as finance minister in this country. We wouldn’t be able to
function because that’s too high a hit. Everybody would know it and
feel it in the economy.
ZAKARIA: There is some substantial gap.
OKONJO-IWEALA: Oh, yes –
ZAKARIA: Right? I mean –
OKONJO-IWEALA: No, we –
ZAKARIA:
– the
World Bank, I think when you were one of the managing directors,
issued a report on the Nigerian economy in which it said hundreds of
billions of dollars over the past 30 or 40 years have been siphoned
off. And so this would be a perfect example of precisely this kind of
siphoning off.
OKONJO-IWEALA: No. I think we should hold
our horses a little bit. Sanusi please ask him never said the money had
been siphoned off. He said it was unaccounted for.
And hold on.
There’s a difference, because when he alleged $49.8 billion – and this
was looked at, it was found that some of
that money had really been
remitted to the
tax agency directly and his people were not aware of it.
So
$16 billion was immediately accounted for that, you know, they didn’t
seem to know the accounting mode of the agency, so that’s what I’m
saying.
But there has been – there’s no doubt that Nigerians feel
suspicious of the
oil sector, that it has been regarded as opaque over
the years and this is not an issue, you know, whether it’s $10.8
billion, whether it’s $1, you know, we can’t afford to lose any money
from the treasury.
ZAKARIA: But then why fire the central banker, a respected central banker?
OKOJO-IWEALA:
You know, Fareed, what I would like to do is perhaps focus on the
economy, because I don’t think I want to get into this issue of
firing/not firing. He’s still governor of the central bank. He has
been suspended. He hasn’t been fired.
But I think we need to
focus on the central issue, which is no one dollar should be lost from
the treasury. Any money that belongs to it must be remitted. That’s
what we’re insisting.
And the president, we pushed for – he has
ordered one yesterday, that there should be a forensic audit to
determine where these moneys, that what is unaccounted for, is it the
$10.8 billion that we are saying from the accounts?
We’ve been working on this for two years.
And
you know, is it $50 billion? Is it $20 billion? Is it $12 billion?
What is the amount? We need to know for the sake of the Nigerian people
and he has ordered that. So we want it to be independent; we want it
to be well done, so that we can lay it to rest.
ZAKARIA: So how do we – how do you solve the problem of corruption?
You’ve been in government twice. You have a reputation for being extremely honest.
What
would you do, if you had a magic wand, if you were president, what
would you do to get Nigeria to get this cancer out of its system?
OKOJO-IWEALA:
Well, you know, Fareed, you know with that, there are no easy answers.
But there’s one thing I want to say and repeat. No one can fight
corruption for Nigerians except Nigerians. Everyone has to be committed
from the top to the bottom to fight it.
And I think there are two
key things that need to be done all along, and it’s not just in
Nigeria. It’s in many developing countries that you need to do this.
But
in our country, you need to, coupled with – by all means pursue those
who are corrupt, punish them, you know, make sure there’s no impunity.
But that has to be coupled with something which doesn’t get as much
attention, which is building institutions. It’s unglamorous; it’s work
that takes time, but we have to do it. We have to put it in place.
ZAKARIA: I have to ask you a question that is not part of directly your portfolio, but it is your government.
Nigeria
has always had laws banning homosexuality. But you advanced a further
law which criminalized it so that somebody who is gay would have to
spend 14 years in prison.
You also have passed – the law says that
people who are in some way promoting gay clubs or gay discussion would
be imprisoned for 10 years. This seems an assault on a minority’s
rights. It also seems an assault on free speech.
Why is Nigeria doing this?
OKOJO-IWEALA:
Well, let me say this, Fareed, that, you know, we’re here in the U.S.
And it took 40 to 50 years or more under conversation of, you know, the
gay community to get where the U.S. is.
I think that, you know, we
need a conversation in the country. We need evolution. Ninety-six
percent of people support these laws, but I think we need to unpack the
laws, for them to see, you know, between being a gay person and between
same-sex marriage because the two are compounded in people’s minds and
there’s a strong sentiment against same-sex marriage, just as you had
here before.
And it’s still evolving. I think it’s a question of
conversation, discussion, evolution, education and engagement over time,
just as happened in this country and in Europe. It’s not something
that happened overnight. So I would say withhold judgment and let us
work on this.
ZAKARIA: Madam Finance Minister, pleasure to have you on.
OKOJO-IWEALA: Thank you.
ZAKARIA: And we will be back.
End.
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
