Social Media in Fighting Corruption

U.S Speaker on anti-corruption, Mr. Peter Ainsworth, spent a few hours at the American Corner in Abuja yesterday with a small group of civil society members active in social media to discuss how it can be used to fight corruption. There was a live tweet component of the program that allowed the outside audience to join in the conversation and ask questions.

The Fight Continues

Today is the second day of the U.S. Embassy hosted program on anti-corruption.  The Speaker, Peter Ainsworth, who is Senior Deputy Chief for Litigation - Public Integrity Section, Criminal Division in the Department of Justice, was at the Nigerian Law School, Abuja.  There he interacted with members of the faculty lead by Head of Academics, Bob Osamor.

Just as in his interaction with civil society, Mr. Ainsworth emphasized that fighting corruption is a continuous process and hope must never be lost.   He said, although systems and approaches in the U.S. and Nigeria may differ, the goal is still the same and that is to successfully enforce anti-corruption laws as deterrence for future behavior.  As simple as this goal seems, achieving it is not simple at all and the U.S., after working on this for two hundred years still makes mistakes.

The Fight Against Corruption is Continuous Commitment

This week the U.S. Embassy, Abuja, is hosting an anti-corruption program with U.S. Speaker Peter Ainsworth.  Peter Ainsworth is Senior Deputy Chief for Litigation - Public Integrity Section, Criminal Division in the Department of Justice.  His section investigates and prosecutes public corruption, election law, and conflicts of interest offenses nationally and internationally.  In addition he personally serves as lead attorney on high-profile matters handled by the Section.  One such high profile case is that of Rickie Scruggs, a highly influential, highly connected and rich Attorney in the State of Mississippi who tried to bribe Judge Henry Lackey, which Mr. Ainsworth used as a case study in his interaction with civil society groups this morning at the National Center for Women Development in Abuja.  The program was put together in collaboration with the Transition Monitoring Group (TMG).