Political Socialization of Corruption and the Future of Nigerian Democracy

Abstract

Politics has become the shortest means of getting rich and becoming famous in Nigeria. This is against the backdrop of what is tenable elsewhere. Official corruption and bare faced graft has interpenetrated the ranks of mortality and political ideologies of absurd levels. The contention of this paper is that official corruption has made electioneering campaigns and election a ‘do or die affair.' This posturing is capable of of suffocating the nascent democracy that has been acquired after tortuous and deadly struggle. The only hope is that politics and political position should be made less attractive by devising global means of combating corruption, the hydra-headed monster that has gradually destroyed the sanctity of democracy. Unless this is done as quickly as possible the future of democracy in this country is bleak. There is also need to change the present corruption ideologies through proper political education and socialization.