The Place of Ethics and Accountability on Governance in Nigeria

Abstract:

This paper explains how ethics and accountability are vital to good governance and the development of any country. It is the thrust of the paper that good governance requires ethical foundation and that government officials must not only be responsible and responsive to the masses, but, more importantly, they must be accountable for their actions and inactions. Nigeria is blessed with abundant natural and economic resources, as well as human resources, but she is also endowed with greedy, selfish and corrupt leaders. We must begin to see corruption not as a sickness but as a symptom of a sickness which is moral decadence in the society. This is why this paper seeks to tackle the problem of corruption from the source, because moral problem requires moral solution. This explains why various measures taken so far to solve the menace of corruption and underdevelopment have not yielded the desired results in Nigeria. This paper therefore endeavours to show the relationship between ethics and accountability in relation to good governance and development. The paper adopts secondary method of gathering data and philosophical analysis.

Keywords: Ethics, accountability, corruption, good governance and representative