Review of Democracy Values and Anti-Corruption Campaign in Nigeria: An Issue for Electoral Integrity and National Development.

Abstract

Elections have offered a way through which the people freely decide who their leaders should be. Unfortunately, in Nigeria, what could be called electoral corruption was observed recently during the election process. This has stigmatized the image of the government, weakened its credibility and reduced the effectiveness of the development programmes and polices which so far have been formulated. The objective of the study is to review democracy values and effort of anti- corruption campaign to achieve electoral integrity for national development. The study adopted a contents analysis, secondary data were gathered from the work of scholars, empirical studies and theoretical framework was made to arrive at a complete understanding of the trends in democratic process and anti-corruption campaign in Nigeria. The study concluded that if societies were not corrupt, if the elite, officials and bureaucrats maintained probity, social development would be faster. The study recommended that for a complete overhauled electoral system and further deepened the democratic ethics that will respond to Nigeria democratic evolution as a country and whose results will adequately mirror the preference of the voting public those who are involved in electoral corruption should be exposed and punish, this will set the nation on the path of good governance which broadly equates genuine popular democracy.