Nigeria: Misplaced Power

There are still several countries in Africa who cannot provide sustainable electricity to the entire populace. An article covers,

Some $2.2bn-worth of Nigerian energy contracts were awarded without a bidding process by the former president and his energy minister, officials say. One was to a company with less than $200 of base capital at the time, a witness told a parliamentary committee. It is investigating why $16bn of investment in the energy sector during Olusegun Obasanjo's eight years in power failed to end power shortages.

As we can see somehow 16 billion dollars has been wrongly distributed throughout the state during Obasanjo's presidential term. Interesting enough we see that Olusegun Obasanjo still has a very influential role within his political party. I think this is an interesting story because we can draw connections from the internal political corruption in this country. I think Obasanjo distributed that 12 billion dollars to influential players throughout the state that could give him power later on. Although there is an investigation into how the funds were wasted, I doubt anyone would be able to convict a devious player such as Obansanjo. On a promising note, at least the issue was brought to light and was not covered up as much of the corruption in Africa is. I think this may signal a key political time in Nigeria in that perhaps the populace will begin to analyze where exactly there money is being spent and for what reasons. Perhaps this signals that some political corruption may be stopped at least for the short term.