A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE STRATEGIES OF KENYA AND NIGERIA’S ANTI-CORRUPTION AGENCIES

Abstract

The adverse effects of corruption on the development of various States have raised global concerns for its control leading to the adoption of the United Nations Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC) in 2003. Kenya Anti-corruption Commission (KACC) and Nigeria’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) are the foremost anti-corruption agencies in both countries. There is paucity of comparative studies devoted to the evaluation of the nexus between the Convention and the strategies of these anti-corruption agencies. The extent to which the Convention has shaped the anti-corruption strategies of these agencies has not been fully explored. This study examined the anti-corruption strategies of KACC in Kenya and EFCC in Nigeria between 2004 and 2008 to determine the extent of implementation and compliance to UNCAC. The study adopted a comparative case-study research design using good governance model. Data were collected from primary and secondary sources through a mix of library and survey research. This involved content review of official journals, international sponsored documents, newspapers, magazines and Internet resources. The survey involved interview of thirty officials purposively selected from both countries supplemented with snowball sampling techniques, nine from the Kenya Anti-corruption Commission (KACC), nine from Nigeria’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and three officials each from four non-governmental anti-corruption agencies in both countries. The interview focused on compliance and implementation of the convention’s five pillars: prevention, criminalisation, asset recovery and international co-operation and technical/information exchange. Responses from the interviews were recorded, transcribed and content analysed. The emergence of the UNCAC, corruption control in Kenya and Nigeria were patterned along typical unproductive anti-corruption strategies. However, the Convention shaped the KACC and EFCC’s strategies via significant compliance to prevention and criminalisation as reflected in the enactment and emergence of anti-corruption laws and agencies in both countries; namely, Anti-Corruption Economic Crimes Act, Witness Protection Act and Anti-corruption Court in Kenya and Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiatives and Money Laundering Prohibition Act and similar acts . International co-operation in prosecution and asset recovery was visible. Thirty-seven convictions were secured and $5 million in assets and cash recovered by KACC while the EFCC secured three hundred and fifty convictions and recovered assets and cash worth $5 billion between 2004 and 2008. Major differences in the strategies of both agencies included the existence of the Special Anti-Corruption Court and provision for the protection of witnesses in Kenya but absent in Nigeria. The EFCC has prosecutionary power but the KACC can only make recommendations to the Attorney-General. The UNCAC’s partial domestication, inadequate funding, delay in prosecuting suspects and inability to recover stolen assets from proven cases were identified as constraints to both agencies’ anti-corruption strategies. The advent of the United Nations Convention Against Corruption transformed the anti-corruption initiatives in Kenya and Nigeria. However, a more effective corruption control within the framework of UNCAC requires proper domestication and the dismantling of the identified constraints.