CORRUPTION AND PUBLIC ACCOUNTABILITYINNIGERIA

The need to fight against corruption in Nigeria led to the promulgation or establishment of Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences Act, 2000. The Act wasthe first bill presented by President Olusegun Obasanjo to the National Assembly for consideration at the inception of the present democratic administration in 1999. It was passed and signed into law on the 13th of June, 2000. The Act establishes the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), which is the apex body saddled with the responsibility of fighting corruption and other related offences. In spite of the existence of the Anti-Graft Act, corruption in all spheres of our national existence is still on the increase. This inglorious monster of all embarrassment, which has eaten deep into the fabrics of our society, keeps exposing us to international odium and opprobrium. The established ICPC so far still has a lot to do in the aspect of corruption by the investigations carried out. The commission ahs come to be accepted by the populace and expectations on its activities are high. The commission is guided by the vision of fighting corruption to a 9 standstill and restoring Nigeria to the enviable standard of respectability and dignity within the Comity of Nations. The objective of this study therefore, is to look at the role of ICPC and to see how far this role has been performed. The views of scholars on this subject is reviewed in chapter two, wealsolook at the causes and effects of corruption in the same chapter. Chapter three looked at the stage of data presentation, interpretation and analysis, chi-square (X2) was employed for its effectiveness and near accuracy in social science research. This also followed the research design. It is, however, the findings of this work that corruption in Nigeria may have been encouraged by the level of poor education, poor salary among others that exist in the country. This project may now serve as a reference term to others who maybe doing similar corruption in Nigeria. The researcher recommends that: Workers should be well paid. , A worker’s pay should always reflect the socio-economic situation in the country and Education should be given priority in the government budget. If possible, free education to all levels should be introduced and enforced.