ICPC Boss: Integrity in Public Administration Key to Anti-Corruption Fight, Economic Stability

. Mohammed Idris: Graft war must transcend arrests, prosecutions to bolstering institutions, systems capable of preventing abuse

. CBN director, Sidi-Alli, wins 2026 Spokesperson of the Year award

James Emejo in Abuja

Chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), Dr. Musa Adamu Aliyu, has said anti-corruption reforms must no longer be treated merely as a law-enforcement, noting that integrity in public administration had become critical to economic stability, investment climate and development outcomes.
He spoke during his keynote address at the 4th Economic Confidential Lecture and 6th National Spokespersons Awards, organised by Image Merchants Promotions Limited
in Abuja.
Aliyu said linked the effectiveness of economic reforms directly to the country’s ability to reduce corruption, strengthen institutions and communicate government actions credibly.
According to him, corruption undermines economic transformation by diverting public resources, weakening institutions, increasing the cost of governance, discouraging investment and eroding public confidence.
Also speaking at the ocassion, Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, said the country’s anti-corruption campaign must move beyond arrests and prosecutions to strengthening institutions and systems capable of preventing abuse.
He said corruption, economic stability and public communication were closely interconnected, noting that sustainable economic stability would remain difficult where corruption weakens institutions, distorts public expenditure and erodes public confidence.
This came as the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) acting Director, Corporate Communications, Hakama Sidi-Ali, was named the 2026 Spokesperson of the Year, emerging as the overall winner at the awards.
Sidi-Ali clinched the top communication award ahead of other nominees at an event that recognised individuals and institutions considered to have demonstrated excellence in public communication, crisis management, media relations, digital engagement and corporate affairs.
However, the ICPC chairman further disclosed that it uncovered fresh cases of payroll fraud in the public service, including an official who allegedly placed 14 members of his family on the government payroll.
The commission identified another individual who allegedly enrolled his wife, children and other relatives as public servants and collected as many as 13 salaries.
Aliyu said investigations into ghost workers had revealed sophisticated manipulation of government payroll systems, with individuals exploiting weaknesses in the system to divert public funds through fictitious employees.
According to him, one of the cases involved an individual who enrolled 14 members of his family on the government payroll.
He said, “We discovered that one person enrolled 14 members of his family. He lived in a religious hotel, a hotel at the public office, receiving salaries.”
The ICPC boss said another case involved an individual who allegedly enrolled his wife, daughter, son and other relatives and received 13 salaries.
He said, “Another person enrolled his wife, his daughter, his son, and others and was receiving 13 salaries.
Aliyu disclosed that the commission had identified about 900 suspected ghost workers and published their names, challenging those listed to establish that they were genuine employees.
He said the investigation into the suspected payroll fraud lasted about a year, during which the commission uncovered the methods allegedly used to manipulate payroll records, adding “We spent one year, one single year, on ghost workers.”
According to him, some of the fraudulent entries appeared legitimate on the payroll, complete with names and email addresses, but the bank accounts attached to them belonged to different individuals.
“When they insert their names, you will see their name in the payroll. You will see their email. But when you check the account number, you will see the name of the person. So, that is how these things have been done,” Aliyu added.
He stressed that the financial implications of payroll fraud went beyond the immediate payment of salaries, as fictitious employees could also become beneficiaries of other government schemes.
He said such fraudulent entries could translate into “ghost pension, ghost mortgage, ghost housing fund” and even fictitious health insurance benefits, further increasing the burden on public finances.
The commission, he added, recovered over N24 billion in 2024 from ghost pension-related activities.
He said the commission was strengthening collaboration with other government agencies while deploying preventive measures to detect and block leakages before public funds were lost.
Aliyu said the ICPC was also shifting greater attention towards prevention, arguing that stopping corruption before it occurred was more effective than relying entirely on prosecution after public resources had been diverted.
“It is better for us to do that than to engage in filing criminal charges. How many charges can we file?” he asked.
Nonetheless, Aliyu said the anti-corruption objective should not be an unrealistic pursuit of completely eliminating corruption, but reducing it to a level where it no longer constitutes a structural impediment to development.
Aliyu said the commission’s experience had shown that preventing corruption before public resources were lost was more sustainable and cost-effective than recovering funds after they had been diverted.
He identified the Treasury Single Account (TSA), Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System (IPPIS), beneficial ownership transparency, improved public procurement, whistleblower mechanisms and digital governance as reforms that had strengthened the country’s integrity architecture.
He said these initiatives were being reinforced by the National Anti-Corruption Strategy 2022-2026, which combines prevention, enforcement, public engagement, ethical re-orientation and recovery of proceeds of crime.
Aliyu disclosed that between 2023 and June 2026, the ICPC had tracked 4,582 public projects valued at over N22.53 trillion.
He said through the commission’s Constituency and Executive Projects Tracking Initiative (CEPTI), the return of projects worth N507.04 billion to construction sites was favilitated while generating about savings of N385.62 billion for government.
The stressed that the figures demonstrated that anti-corruption interventions can produce measurable economic value without waiting for criminal prosecution to be completed.
He said when integrity governs public expenditure, government projects are more likely to be completed as intended, infrastructure delivered to communities and public funds translated into tangible economic benefits.
Aliyu said the commission’s System Study and Review, Corruption Risk Assessments and Ethics and Integrity Compliance Scorecard were designed to identify weaknesses in government processes and eliminate opportunities for corrupt practices before they become losses.
Among the preventive interventions highlighted by Aliyu was the ICPC’s corruption risk assessment of Nigeria’s port sector.
The exercise, he said, identified procedural weaknesses that created opportunities for corruption and inefficiency and subsequently resulted in harmonised Standard Operating Procedures and strengthened integrity measures.
The intervention has implications beyond anti-corruption enforcement, as reducing administrative discretion and procedural bottlenecks at the ports could improve trade facilitation and investor confidence.
Aliyu linked the focus to evidence from the Commonwealth Africa Anti-Corruption Centre’s April 2026 study of 14 Commonwealth African countries, which identified public administration and defence, construction, and health and social services as some of the sectors perceived to be most vulnerable to corruption.
He said the ICPC’s risk-based approach was deliberately targeted at sectors where corruption presented the greatest threat to public resources and service delivery.
Aliyu also drew attention to two recent enforcement outcomes to demonstrate the economic implications of asset recovery.
He stated that in a case involving the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria, the ICPC secured a Federal High Court order for the forfeiture of unlawfully acquired properties valued at more than N5 billion.
The court, he said, also directed the completion of 962 housing units, effectively converting an anti-corruption enforcement action into a potential housing delivery intervention.
Similarly, the commission secured the final forfeiture of more than N941.9 million recovered in its investigation of the 2024 IPPIS payroll fraud involving 909 defendants.
The chairman argued that such recoveries should not be viewed simply as enforcement statistics.
Rather, he said, they represent public resources restored to productive use and reinforce fiscal discipline by making it more difficult for public funds to be diverted through payroll manipulation and other forms of fraud.
ICPC warns against ‘loud’ anti-corruption messaging
Perhaps one of the more unusual aspects of Aliyu’s address was his warning that anti-corruption communication can itself become counterproductive if it merely amplifies the perception that corruption is everywhere.
He said messages repeatedly portraying corruption as pervasive could breed public fatigue, resignation and the belief that corrupt conduct was normal or inevitable.
Instead, he advocated communication that was specific, locally relevant and connected to the everyday experiences of citizens.
According to him, public institutions should communicate tangible outcomes—completed projects, recovered funds, restored housing units and improved services—rather than merely issuing general condemnations of corruption.
The argument represents a significant departure from conventional anti-corruption messaging, which often concentrates on the scale of the problem.
Aliyu said the objective should be to communicate the seriousness of corruption without inadvertently convincing citizens that resistance is futile.
He cited the rise in citizen reporting as evidence that public attitudes could change when citizens believed that reporting corruption could produce results.
He referenced the UNODC/NBS National Corruption Survey 2024, which found that the rate at which bribery incidents were reported increased from 3.6 per cent in 2019 to 8.6 per cent in 2023.
More importantly, he said, the proportion of reports that resulted in formal procedures against implicated public officials rose from 16 per cent to 45 per cent.
For Aliyu, the figures suggest that citizen reporting becomes more meaningful when complaints are connected to credible institutional action.
The ICPC chairman also identified artificial intelligence and emerging digital technologies as the next major frontier in the fight against corruption.
He said predictive analytics, fraud detection, procurement monitoring, financial intelligence and anomaly detection could allow authorities to identify corruption risks before financial losses occurred.
He warned however, that technology could also create new avenues for fraud through cyber-enabled crimes, identity theft, deepfakes and digital misinformation.
Consequently, he said technological innovation must be accompanied by legal safeguards, ethical standards, institutional capacity and international cooperation.
He said enforcement could address the symptoms of corruption, but sustained change required a transformation in societal attitudes.
The commission, he disclosed, was consolidating its integrity education initiatives into a National Schools Integrity Programme, drawing lessons from countries such as Hong Kong and Singapore.
He said sustained school-based integrity education had contributed to the transformation of those jurisdictions over a generation.
He said the ICPC would continue to work with government, the private sector, civil society, development partners, the media and citizens to strengthen transparency and accountability.
Aliyu said, “Anti-corruption, economic stability and effective communication are therefore not separate policy objectives. They are mutually reinforcing foundations upon which Nigeria’s future prosperity depends.”
According to him, the ultimate measure of success is not the number of arrests or prosecutions, but whether public institutions become more predictable, public spending produces greater value, citizens regain confidence and integrity becomes embedded in economic and governance systems.
On his part, Idris said the administration of President Bola Tinubu was pursuing reforms under the Renewed Hope Agenda aimed at strengthening the economy, improving transparency and accountability, restoring investor confidence and ensuring that public resources deliver greater value to Nigerians.
He identified the increasing digitalisation of government processes, greater transparency in public financial management, improved procurement systems and reduction of discretionary bottlenecks as critical components of the government’s anti-corruption strategy.
The minister said the ultimate objective should be to establish institutions where accountability was embedded in the system rather than dependent solely on the integrity or disposition of individuals occupying public offices.
Idris also linked the success of economic reforms to the ability of government to communicate effectively with citizens, stressing that Nigerians deserved to understand what government was doing, why difficult decisions were necessary and how such policies were expected to improve their lives.
He urged government communicators to move away from viewing communication as a tool for propaganda, describing effective communication as the provision of timely and accurate information, acknowledgement of challenges, clear explanation of policy choices and demonstration of progress through facts and evidence.
He said, “Effective communication is not propaganda,” he said, adding that communication must also be a two-way process in which government not only speaks to citizens but also listens to them.
The minister stressed that public trust was critical to the sustainability of reforms, particularly where policies required citizens and businesses to make difficult adjustments in the short term in expectation of longer-term economic gains.
Chief Executive, Image Merchants Promotions Limited, Mr. Yusha’u Shuaib, said the annual lecture was designed to deepen conversations around good governance, transparency and accountability.
He said the gathering provided an opportunity for policymakers, professionals, scholars and communication experts to examine ways of strengthening governance through effective public communication.
He said, “We are honoured to host yet another gathering of leaders, professionals, scholars, and communication experts committed to strengthening governance, promoting transparency, and advancing excellence in public communication.
“This year marks the fourth edition of the Economic Confidential Lecture. Our focus remains consistent: strengthening governance through transparency, accountability, and effective public engagement. The 2026 theme examines how anti‑corruption reforms, economic stability, and strategic communication reinforce public trust and institutional credibility.”