Poverty, Corruption and Nation Building in Nigeria

Poverty can be said to be a good corollary of corrupt practices when bad and irresponsive leaders are at the helm of affairs. It is obvious that in a corrupt society like Nigeria, a coterie of people sit atop the collective patrimony, thereby making provision of essential services very difficult or impossible for the citizenry. Nigeria with a population that is well over 180 million people, has found it difficult to forge oneness and unity among its heterogeneous population. The paper takes a close look at the impacts of the dialectics of poverty and corruption on nation building as a project. Poverty reduction for the umpteenth time has been at the front burner of successive governments’ agenda, however, virtually all efforts to alleviate poverty have turned to be a conduit pipe for corruption which ends in a vicious circle of generation of poverty. According to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS, 2010), Nigeria opines that about 69% which is about 112.47 million live below poverty line. Despite this eye opening information, Nigerian politicians and civil servants continue to entrench poverty wittingly by virtue of their corrupt practice, with the resultant effect of making ineffectual the project of nation building in Nigeria. Keywords: Poverty, Corruption, Nigeria and Nation Buildin