Corruption, bane of human dev index, life expectancy -Prof. Sagay

Chairman of Presidential Advisory Committee against corruption (PACAC), professor Itse Sagay, SAN, has revealed that life expectancy in Nigeria today is determined on the level of damage corruption has done on individual life expectancy and development index.

Professor Sagay, said this recently in Abuja, while delivering a lecture with the topic, a critical review of the Anti-corruption war in Nigeria, strategies, challenges to commemorate the occasion of annual feast of Barracuda/symposium of the National Association of Sea dogs pirates confraternity.

The National Association for sea dogs NAS pirate confraternity, was established in 1952 by seven undergraduates of the university collage Ibadan in response to the prevailing predisposition of the Nations of class privilege, elitism and indifference to the social realities of the nation, especially by students of middle class upbringing, scions of business tycoons and colonial aristocracy.

Chairman of the presidential committee on anti corruption, further remarked that the menace of corruption currently had reflected in Nigeria’s position in the Human Development Index which is a comparative measure of life expectancy, literacy, education, standard of living and others. It is a standard means of measuring the general well-being of the population of a country.

According to him, “Nigeria was ranked 152th out of 188 amongst countries with the lowest HDI, even though we possess enormous natural and human resources, unlike Togo, Benin, Niger, Central African Republic, Burkina Faso, Chad, Haiti, Sudan, South Sudan, Zimbabwe, Sierra Leone and Mali, with whom we are grouped in the HDI.

Corruption is at the root of our low position in this index of human standard of living.

The senior advocate further reasoned that a reflection in Nigeria’s position in the Human Development Index is a comparative measure of life expectancy, literacy, education, standard of living, stating that It is a standard means of measuring the general well-being of the population of a country.

Last year, he revealed, Nigeria was ranked 152th out of 188 amongst countries with the lowest HDI, even though she possess enormous natural and human resources, unlike Togo, Benin, Niger, Central African Republic, Burkina Faso, Chad, Haiti, Sudan, South Sudan, Zimbabwe, Sierra Leone and Mali, with whom Nigeria is grouped in the HDI.

In dealing with the topic, he said, the starting point must be an appreciation of the scale and enormity of the problem, the ubiquitous presence of the scourge and its overwhelming and continuously unraveling nature in Nigeria. “In short, corruption in this country is a hydra headed monster.”