The Role Of Standardisation In Winning The Fight Against Corruption As Sustainable Path T Africa’s Transformation -By Abdulrasheed Hammad

According to Africa union chairman, chairperson moussafaki Mr. Mahamat he said and I quote “Corruption is an endemic that affects people daily lives, from poorly built roads to unequal access to health care and medicine”. Therefore corruption is a form of dishonesty or criminal activity being perpetrated by a person or organization entrusted with a position of authority, often to acquire illicit benefit. Corruption may include series of malfeasances including bribery, the rigging of the election, examination malpractice, and looting of the public treasury, to mention but few. Corruption is one of the major factors that is devasting Africa at large. This corruption does not limit itself to Africa leaders only, but corruption starts from the grassroots level and grows up to the level of grand corruption.

Corruption can occur on different scales. Corruption ranges from small favors between a small number of people (petty corruption) to corruption that affects the government on a large scale (grand corruption), and corruption that is so prevalent that it is part of the everyday structure of society, including corruption as one of the symptoms of organized crime. The grassroots corruption including the petty corruption that used to happen between the boss and worker, the teacher and student, the parent and children and vice versa, the grand corruption is the corruption between the leader to the citizen ranging from the three arms of government which are executive, legislature and judiciary. the petty corruption and grand corruption is an endemic that can only be cured and the way to put an end to the decay that’s going in Africa, we have to conform, formalize and homogenize all the country in Africa to ensure that corruption becomes history in the entirety of Africa.

Standardization is the process of implementing and developing technical standards based on the consensus of different parties that include firms, users, interest groups, standards organizations, and governments Standardization can help to maximize compatibility, interoperability, safety, repeatability, or quality. Standardization has a huge impact to play to proffer solutions to the endemic that Africa is grappling with as a continent. The Africa Union has a role to play to fight against corruption in Africa, by ensuring that all the countries in Africa homogenize themselves as one entity and unify themselves in order to fight against corruption in Africa.

As I said earlier that, the Africa Union has a vital role to play by supporting anti-corruption programs such as a model anti-corruption law and ensure the implementation of those rules without fear or favour by strengthening their legal and institutional framework. They should establish a body that will ensure that whoever engages in any corrupt practices should be prosecuted irrespective of the country, gender, the post that the person holds, background, or whether rich or poor. It’s very important to for them to make sure all the rules laid down should be implemented because, in a situation where there is no strong implementation of the law, the corruption cannot be conquered because the punishment of the offender should serve as a deterrent to others who have the same intention to engage in any form of corrupt practices.

The impact of writers, essayists, a poet is also very important to curb the malady of corruption in Africa, by writing drama, prose or poetry to correct the social vices like bribery and corruption, embezzlement, bad governance, this can also serve as a solution to fight against corruption in Africa. The Africa Union should establish youth essay competition to write about anti-corruption in Africa and numerous ways to tackle the problem of corruption. Our educational syllabus should also be restructured.

The role of writers; journalists, poets, and human right advocates are also paramount in curbing the malady of corruption in Africa, by writing drama, prose or poetry to that will enlighten the public on the devastating effect of corruption to the society such as bribery and corruption, embezzlement, bad governance, this can also serve as a solution to fight against corruption in Africa. The Africa Union should establish a youth essay competition to write about anti-corruption in Africa and to tackle the problem of corruption. The Body meant for the reviewing of literature students’ syllabus should also add the drama, poetry, and prose that depict the danger of corruption in the society and the way to solve it. I am very glad that most of our Africa prose and poetry dedicated for Literature comprises the novel that talked about the corruption in Africa and the solution to the problem, for instance, some of the Africa writers have written many novels on how to tackle the corruption in Africa such as Harvest of corruption by frank ogodo ogbeche which depicted the corruption and it’s consequences and the way to tackle it in our society, country and Africa at large.

The government of each country also has a vital role to play by improving fiscal transparency and financial governance including improvement of the public procurement system and strengthening institutional and oversight capacity. And the government should support citizens participation in an area like a budget by tracking and monitoring the performance of public enterprises, for example, if the government releases money for the project, the person awarded the project may not implement it because the government fails to track any budget releases to ensure development in a country and Africa at large.

Furthermore, the petty corruption which is regarded as the corruption from the grassroots can also be solved if the parents, guidance, teachers, clerics, pastors, to ensure that they inculcate in the people the consequence of corruption and the way to abstain from corruption and also to warn them by a sermon and preaching to let them know and enlighten them about corruption and it’s ensuing damages in our social, economic and political life. this can go a long way in quenching corruption from the grassroots level.

In conclusion, The Africa union should encourage and support the implementation of the AU convention by preventing and combating corruption including strengthening the capacity of the AU advisory board on corruption. The conformity and uniformity of Africa are also very important by supporting and encouraging the good governance, gender equality, respect for human right, justice and rule of law, and to carry along all the Africa country to fight against decay, breakdown, decomposition, the injustice that is facing Africa as a continent. I rest my pen.

God bless Nigeria
God bless Africa

Abdulrasheed Hammad is a 300-Level student of Law at Usmanu Danfodiyo
University, Sokoto. He can be reached through this Gmail :
abdulrasheedhammad@gmail.com or Whatapp contact: 08083638703.