Corruption, money laundering and Nigeria’s crisis of development

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the congruence between Nigeria’s unremitting rule of law deficit, corruption pandemic and its crisis of developmentalism. The paper proves that market failures and state failures are mutually reinforcing and are functions of systemic official corruption in the private and public sectors of the Nigerian economy. Design/methodology/approach This study is library-based. It relies on secondary data generated by the variegated multilateral agencies, law reports of international and municipal tribunals, relevant books, journals, monographs policy papers and so forth as the basis of analysis. Findings Findings suggest that Nigeria’s corruption pandemic is a derivative of its unremitting rule of law deficit and that its crisis of developmentalism is a logical function of the pervasive normlessness, very wide latitude for discretion, arbitrariness, weak institutions and lack of centrality of law and its institutions, which characterise its body politik . Social implications Systemic corruption in Nigeria affects the citizens’ perception of social justice and equity and undermines economic efficiency. It has also distorted the work reward causality, which has engendered a rentier social-economic order. Originality/value By first demonstrating the congruence between Nigeria’s rule of law deficit, corruption and economic and governance failure; the paper focusses on the total breakdown of norms in the Nigerian private and public sectors and resultant stultification of economic growth, sustainable human development and pervasive impoverishment of the citizenry.