Politics and Society
Botswana rated the least corrupt African country and Nigeria wallows below
The recent Corruption Perception Index (CPI) released by Transparency International ranked Botswana as the least corrupt country in Africa. Botswana has a strong anti-corruption campaign. Nigeria was ranked 148th in the world, a drop in performance from last year’s rankings.
The southern African country of Botswana has once again taken the lead as the least corrupt country in the continent. The ratings were made by Transparency International (TI) in its Corruption Perception Index (CPI) in Berlin.
The government of Botswana announced its pleasure to be cited as the least corrupt country for the 22nd year in a row. The country moved a step higher than last year and was ranked 34 out of 180 countries globally.
The ratings revealed Rwanda and Namibia as the second least corrupt countries in Africa and 48 in the world. Nigeria was ranked 148 dropping from 136th in 2016. Despite the strong anti-corruption stance by Nigeria’s president Muhammadu Buhari, there seems to be no improvement in the fight against corruption, and the TI ratings are testament to the slow impact of the anti corruption initiatives by President Buhari’s government.
This Office is pleased to announce that, for the 22nd year in a row, Botswana was cited as being the least corrupt country in Africa, as well as among the least corrupt countries in the world.
— Botswana Government (@BWGovernment) February 22, 2018
Read: Botswana has the best police force in Africa, Nigeria ranked the worst
Ugandan anti-corruption sign. Corruption greatly undermines government effectiveness. Photo: futureatlas.com/Flickr/ www.futureatlas.com
In a statementTransparency International said, “This year’s Corruption Perceptions Index highlights that the majority of countries are making little or no progress in ending corruption, while further analysis shows journalists and activists in corrupt countries risking their lives every day in an effort to speak out.”
Last year, the World Internal Security and Police Index revealed that Botswana has the best police force in Africa, followed by Rwanda. Nigeria’s police force was ranked as the worst.
The Corruption Perception Index ranks 180 countries by their perceived levels of public sector corruption according to experts and businesspeople. The index used a scale of 0 to 100, with 0 being highly corrupt and 100 very clean.
Botswana scored 61, Seychelles 60, Cape Verde and Rwanda both scored 55 while Nigeria scored 27. Countries such as Sierra Leone, Malawi, Liberia, Djibouti, Egypt, Niger, Togo, Gabon and Kenya did better than Nigeria. The average score for the Sub-Saharan Africa region was 32.
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Some social media commentators crowned Botswana the giant of Africa. Botswana, Rwanda, Cape Verde, Seychelles and Namibia performed better than countries such as Italy, Greece and Hungary.
Botswana and other top performing African countries have made it a priority to implement anti-corruption laws.