By Princess-Ekwi Ajide Abuja
The 2021 Ethics and Integrity Compliance Card (EICS) of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) indicates the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) emerged the second highest ranking agency with a score of 89.6% out of 360 Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of the Federal Government
A recent release by the anti-graft agency, showed the Nigerian Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC) came first with 89.8% in the rating.
The EICS rating which commenced in 2019 is deployed by the ICPC annually in Federal Ministries, Department and Agencies (MDAs) to assess their compliance with extant ethical, integrity, statutory, policy and regulatory standards and practices which is in consonance with its preventive mandate as provided in section 6 (b)-(d) of the Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences act 2000. It also reinforces the drive to strengthen probity, accountability and transparency in public service and entities.
The aim of the EICS deployment in MDAs is to diminish corruption risks, system abuse, revive ethics and integrity benchmark with the view of revitalizing service delivery.
The tool was deployed between May and August 2021 in 360 MDAs. 301 MDAs responded to the assessment and 59 MDAs declined. Participants were rated according to their levels and degrees of compliance. Unresponsive MDAs were classified as “High Corruption Risk Agencies” (HCRAs) and are envisaged for further inquiries and actions by the Commission.
The deployment of the Scorecard is vital to building good ethical structures in all institutions in the country while organizations are encouraged to replicate the tool in their workplace and adopt ethics and integrity compliance practices into their systems to diminish corruption while also inculcating the values and principles of the National Ethics and Integrity Policy (NEIP).
A statement by BPE’s Head, Public Relations, Chidi Ibeh reminded that in 2019, BPE as a reform agency was also recognized by the SERVICOM Corporate Office with the award of a four star (****) ranking following SERVICOM’s Functionality Evaluation conducted in November that year.
