The more obvious costs of corruption include the depletion of national wealth, lack of public infrastructure, high levels of crime and insecurity, unnecessary deaths from preventable or treatable medical conditions, impunity, injustice, mediocrity, brain drain, hopelessness, and aimlessness, etc. I now mention some other less obvious or hitherto unknown but high costs of corruption.
That is money coming from outside, into Nigeria. That is “easy money” is it not? The foreign pensioner would need to either buy or rent a home in Nigeria. So money for us. The pensioner would eat food and buy clothes. So money for us. The pensioner would need medical care. So money for us. The pensioner’s children and grandchildren would come and visit as tourists. So money for us.
Sadly, corruption prevents foreign pensioners from living among us. The insecurity, the chaotic and filthy environment, the lack of electricity, lack of public transport, lack of credible medical care, dangerous roads without pavements or traffic lights for the elderly and infirm to cross, the greedy national attitudes towards people, etc, mean that Nigeria is losing out on the all-around very positive presence that foreign pensioners would have been to us.
This is a serious consequence of corruption so I repeat it. Open defecation, poor nutrition, and malaria which cause us to be stunted in growth and stunted in intelligence are due to lack of proper sanitation, proper waste management, and proper health care services. These are fallouts of corruption.