NIGERIA: The head of Nigeria's senate stepped down yesterday over bribery allegations, the most senior head to roll in a widening crackdown on corruption in the world's eighth-biggest oil-exporting country.
Africa's most populous state, ranked in a recent survey as the third most corrupt country in the world, has stepped up a high-profile anti-graft campaign as part of efforts to persuade western creditor nations to cancel its $35 billion foreign debt.
Adolphus Wabara, third in Nigeria's constitutional hierarchy, had been widely expected to quit after President Olusegun Obasanjo publicly accused him and six other lawmakers of having received a $400,000 bribe to pass an inflated education budget this year.
Mr Obasanjo made the allegations against his former ally and member of his own People's Democratic Party in a nationwide broadcast last month, calling the scandal a "sordid matter".
"I hereby step aside as the president of the senate to enable me to attend to all the allegations against me," Mr Wabara, who has denied any involvement, told the senate.
"I pledge to make myself available to all panels investigating the allegations," he said.
His resignation follows the sacking of two government ministers over the past two weeks and the forced retirement of Nigeria's police chief in January on allegations of corruption and mismanagement of public funds.
Last month Mr Obasanjo fired the education minister and scolded lawmakers for "wallowing in corruption" and undermining debt relief efforts.
On Monday the housing minister was dismissed for allegedly offering to sell more than 200 official properties to top government and military officials at below market prices.
Only hours earlier the former police chief had been charged with stealing and laundering some $100 million during his three-year tenure. - (Reuters)