The Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria, ICAN Abakaliki, and District Society, on Thursday identified a lack of political will as responsible for the persistence of corruption in the country.
The body said Nigeria has the best economic policy in the world but implementation was the problem to tackle corruption.
Eke Michael Abakaliki District Chairman of the foremost professional Accountancy body in Nigeria stated this in Abakaliki during media interaction as part of 2021 End of the year activities of ICAN in the state.
Eke said the body was working assiduously with the government of the federation to ensure that the country was free from financial fraud.
According to him, ICAN introduced a policy called accountability index which targets streamlining the financial flow of states in the country.
He said the accountability Index initiated by the body can help regulate government finances and block loopholes of financial leakage.
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He urged leaders of the country to see corruption as a setback to development and join the federal government to fight it to a logical conclusion.
“It is not now that the issue of fighting corruption started but the major problem with it is lack of political will to tackle the actual fight and it spreads to other parts of the economy.
“Nigeria has one of the finest economic policies in the whole world but what hinders it is implementation. Implementation is the problem, it is not that the government of the federation doesn’t have the policy to fight corruption, they have but what hinders it is the lack of political will to fight it to its logical conclusion.
“ICAN most times would like to partner government to strengthen the issue of corruption. three years ago there was a policy, what we call accountability index which will pass through all the states. It is a kind of appraisal of how government runs its finances, and many of the governments were found to be operating below standard.
“ICAN’s role is to direct the government and for the government to accept the direction and that acceptance is what is lacking, that is one of the areas ICAN is assisting to fight corruption.
“ICAN is working in so many of the world bank programs and they champion most of the government policies that help to redirect the economy of the states and the federal government and they are working”. He said.
