Britain and Nigeria's half-hearted war on corruption

(Financial Express, 21 October 2005) Britain's ECGD has shown little inclination to follow up allegations that a client agreed to pay $170m of bribes to secure billions of dollars of work on a giant Nigerian gas plant. The Commission for Africa set up and chaired by Mr Blair to devise an agenda for the G8 summit highlighted the failure of rich country export credit agencies to tackle corruption. These are important elements in the controversy over $18 billion in Nigerian debt relief recently approved by the Paris Club.