Sope Willams Elegbe

Last updated
Sope Williams
Born9 August
Geneva, Switzerland
NationalityBritish-Nigerian
EducationUniversity of Lagos

London School of Economics

University of Nottingham
OccupationProfessor of Law
EmployerStellenbosch University
Known forPublic Procurement Anti-Corruption
Notable workFighting Corruption in Public Procurement (2012);Public Procurement and Multilateral Development Banks (2017); Public Procurement Regulation for 21st Century Africa (2018); Public Procurement Regulation in Africa: Development in uncertain times (2020).
AwardsAnti-Corruption Ambassador(UNODC), Open Contracting Partnership Anti-Corruption Champion (2021)

Sope Williams is a Nigerian professor of Law, public procurement scholar and anti-corruption champion. [1]

Contents

She is known for being an advocate for and speaker on Open Governance, Blockchain, Gender responsive public procurement, integrity and anti-Corruption, and sustainable development.

Sope is a consultant for different governments, the World Bank and is currently on the anti-corruption sub-committee of the International Bar Association in charge of exclusion and debarment [2] In December 2022, she was awarded the prestigious Sheikh Tamim Bin Hamad Al-Thani International Excellence Award for Anti-Corruption Research and Education in recognition of her research, education and training on anti-corruption law. https://aceaward.com/en/news/details/89

Life

She was born in Geneva, [3] to Chief and Mrs F.O Williams. She attended Geneva English School and later Home Science Primary School, Ikoyi, for her early education. She went on to Queen’s College, Yaba, and the University of Lagos. She was called to the Nigerian Bar in 1999 after which she went to the London School of Economics where she obtained an LLM with distinction in 2000.

Career

Sope Williams started her career at the University of Stirling, Scotland, as a lecturer in business law in 2000. In 2003, moved to the University of Nottingham and joined the School of Law. In 2008 she was co-opted to work on a project on the World Bank’s expert group that helped the Bank reform its procurement process which lasted till 2011. She obtained a PhD in public procurement and anti-corruption law in 2011 from the University of Nottingham.

Sope was the Head of Research at the Nigerian Economic Summit Group, Lagos from 2014 till 2016. In 2016, she moved to South Africa and was appointed a professor of law at Stellenbosch University, South Africa. From 2018 to 2021, she was the Head of the department of Mercantile law, and is currently the Deputy Director of the African Procurement Law Unit. [4] She is also on the Board of the international NGO- SlaveFree Trade and counter-corruption institute- the Pavocat-Stellenbosch Academy.

Life and work

Her research work is the area of public procurement, anti-corruption, digitalization of the public sector and sustainable development law, with a focus on human rights and sustainable public procurement and the impact of corruption on sustainable procurement. [5] She is the author of over 5 books and over 60 peer reviewed academic papers. She has consulted for governments within and outside Africa and is the author of several influential policy reports on open government, on anti-corruption and gender responsive procurement.

On February 15, 2016, she trained Nigerian Lawmakers in the House of Assembly on Nigerian public procurement law. Her training highlighted that Nigeria has been defrauded because of the loopholes in the public procurement act and the failure of agencies to enforce the law. Sope Williams, said that a solution was to engage legislative, institutional and organisational changes in public procurement reforms. [6] From 2016-2029 she trained over 300 investigators from the South African Office of the Public Protector in investigating public procurement corruption.

Sope is the Vice-Chair of the Debarment and Exclusion sub-committee of the International Bar Association and a member of Transparency International’s Working Group on Debarment and Exclusion. She is also a Fellow at the Public Procurement Research Group, University of Nottingham since 2020, and an advisor international institutions and government bodies on procurement and anti-corruption matters who trains the public and the private sector in ethics and anti-corruption law. [7]

She co-runs the LLM and PG Diploma in Public Procurement Policy and Regulation in Stellenbosch University. [8]

In 2019, the South African National Research Foundation rated her to be an “Internationally recognised researcher" with a B2 rating. The Open Contracting Partnership selected her as an anti-corruption champion in 2021. She has been an invited and keynote speaker at over 100 conferences in over 30 countries.

She has published work on Public Procurement, Open Governance, Integrity and Anti-Corruption, WTO Law and Development Law.

Works

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Political corruption</span> Use of power by government officials for illegitimate private gain

Political corruption is the use of powers by government officials or their network contacts for illegitimate private gain.

Good governance is the process of measuring how public institutions conduct public affairs and manage public resources and guarantee the realization of human rights in a manner essentially free of abuse and corruption and with due regard for the rule of law. Governance is "the process of decision-making and the process by which decisions are implemented ". Governance in this context can apply to corporate, international, national, or local governance as well as the interactions between other sectors of society.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala</span> Nigerian economist (born 1954)

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala is a Nigerian-American economist, who has been serving as the Director-General of the World Trade Organization since March 2021. She is the first woman and first African to lead the World Trade Organization as Director-General.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Corruption in Kenya</span> Institutional corruption in the country

Corruption in the government of Kenya has a history which spans the era of the founding president Jomo Kenyatta, to Daniel arap Moi's KANU, Mwai Kibaki's PNU governments. President Uhuru Kenyatta's Jubilee Party government, and the current William Ruto's Kenya Kwanza administration has also been riddled with massive cases of graft.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Government procurement</span> Purchases by a government body

Government procurement or public procurement is the procurement of goods, services and works on behalf of a public authority, such as a government agency. Amounting to 12 percent of global GDP in 2018, government procurement accounts for a substantial part of the global economy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Corruption in Nigeria</span> Institutional corruption in the country

Corruption is an anti-social attitude awarding improper privileges contrary to legal and moral norms and impairs the authorities' capacity to secure the welfare of all citizens. Corruption in Nigeria is a constant phenomenon. In 2012, Nigeria was estimated to have lost over $400 billion to corruption since its independence.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Corruption in Angola</span> Institutional corruption in Angola

The institutional corruption in Angola refers to the pervasive and long-standing issue of corruption within the country's government and public institutions. The aftermath of the 30-year civil war and the influence of the Soviet command economy have resulted in significant institutional damage and the emergence of a centralized government with authoritarian tendencies. This has allowed the president and his associates to exert control over the nation's resources, enabling them to exploit the economy for personal gain through legal and extra-legal means.

This article is about the economics of corruption. If you wanted to read about corruption in general, visit article about corruption.

Civil service reform is a deliberate action to improve the efficiency, effectiveness, professionalism, representativity and democratic character of a civil service, with a view to promoting better delivery of public goods and services, with increased accountability. Such actions can include data gathering and analysis, organizational restructuring, improving human resource management and training, enhancing pay and benefits while assuring sustainability under overall fiscal constraints, and strengthening measures for performance management, public participation, transparency, and combating corruption.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oby Ezekwesili</span> Nigerian accountant and politician

Obiageli "Oby" Ezekwesili is an economic policy expert, an advocate for transparency, accountability, good governance and human capital development, a humanitarian and an activist. She is a former vice president for the World Bank's Africa region, co-founder and founding director of Transparency International, co-founder of the #BringBackOurGirls movement and has served twice as Federal Minister in Nigeria. She is also the founder of #FixPolitics Initiative, a research-based citizen-led initiative, the School of Politics Policy and Governance (SPPG), and Human Capital Africa.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Corruption in Ukraine</span> Institutional corruption in the country

Corruption is an issue in Ukrainian society going back to the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. After declaring independence from the Soviet Union, Ukraine faced a series of politicians from different sides of the political spectrum, as well as criminal bosses and oligarchs, who used the corruption of police, political parties, and industry to gain power. Despite improvements, as in Moldova corruption remains an obstacle to joining the EU.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Corruption in Somalia</span> Institutional corruption in the country

Corruption in Somalia pertains to purported levels of corruption within Somalia's public and private sectors according to official metrics, anti-graft measures aimed at addressing those issues, as well as political dispensations and structural changes in government affecting transparency. Owing to a reported lack of accountability in the receipt and expenditure of public funds by the Transitional Federal Government, a federal Anti-Corruption Commission was put into place in 2011 so as to deter and eliminate graft. On Transparency International's 2023 Corruption Perceptions Index, Somalia scored 11 on a scale from 0 to 100. When ranked by score, Somalia ranked last among the 180 countries in the Index, where the country ranked first is perceived to have the most honest public sector. For comparison with worldwide scores, the best score was 90, the average score was 43, and the worst score was Somalia's, 11. For comparison with regional scores, the average score among sub-Saharan African countries was 33. The highest score in sub-Saharan Africa was 71 and the lowest score was Somalia's, 11.

Corruption Watch is a South African anti-corruption non-profit organisation that sets out to monitor and expose acts of corruption that involve public resources and donated charitable resources in South Africa. The various focus areas in which the organisation monitors and exposes corruption include corruption in the education sector, police corruption, leadership appointments, corruption in the mining applications processes and its effects of communities, corruption in land ownership and tenure, beneficial ownership transparency, and public procurement. Whistle-blowers are an essential source for the organisation as their whole operational mode is built upon reports received from whistle-blowers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Corruption in Georgia</span> Institutional corruption in the country

Corruption in Georgia had been an issue in the post-Soviet decades. Before the 2003 Rose Revolution, according to Foreign Policy, Georgia was among the most corrupt nations in Eurasia. The level of corruption abated dramatically, however, after the revolution. In 2010, Transparency International (TI) said that Georgia was "the best corruption-buster in the world." While low-level corruption had earlier been largely eliminated, Transparency International Georgia since 2020 has also documented dozens of cases of high-level corruption that remain to be prosecuted.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Corruption in Uganda</span> Institutional corruption in the country

Corruption in Uganda is characterized by grand-scale theft of public funds and petty corruption involving public officials at all levels of society as well as widespread political patronage systems. Elite corruption in Uganda is through a patronage system which has been exacerbated by foreign aid. Aid has been providing the government with large amounts of resources that contribute to the corrupt practices going on within the country. The style of corruption that is used is to gain loyalty and support so that officials can remain in power. One of the more recent forms of corruption is through public procurement because of the lack of transparency with transactions that happen within the government.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Prozorro</span> Ukrainian public electronic procurement system

Prozorro is a public electronic procurement system where state and municipal customers announce tenders to purchase goods, works and services, and business representatives compete for the opportunity to become a state supplier.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Corruption in Guinea-Bissau</span> Institutional corruption in the country

Corruption in Guinea-Bissau occurs at among the highest levels in the world. In Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index for 2023, Guinea-Bissau scored 22 on a scale from 0 to 100. When ranked by score, Guinea-Bissau ranked 158th among the 180 countries in the Index, where the country ranked first is perceived to have the most honest public sector. However, Guinea-Bissau's score has either improved or remained steady every year since its low point in 2018, when it scored 16. For comparison with worldwide scores, the best score in 2023 was 90, the average score was 43, and the worst score was 11. For comparison with regional scores, the average score among sub-Saharan African countries was 33. The highest score in sub-Saharan Africa was 71 and the lowest score was 11. In 2013, Guinea-Bissau scored below the averages for both Africa and West Africa on the Mo Ibrahim Foundation’s Index of African Governance.

Ibrahim Magu, is a Nigerian police officer who served as acting chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC from 9 November 2015, until his suspension on 7 July 2020. He was replaced by Muhammed Umar as the acting EFCC chairman.

Anti-corruption comprises activities that oppose or inhibit corruption. Just as corruption takes many forms, anti-corruption efforts vary in scope and in strategy. A general distinction between preventive and reactive measures is sometimes drawn. In such framework, investigative authorities and their attempts to unveil corrupt practices would be considered reactive, while education on the negative impact of corruption, or firm-internal compliance programs are classified as the former.

Maritime anti-corruption initiatives have emerged in the last decades as a response to the growing threat of transnational corruption in the maritime domain, specifically in the shipping industry which is responsible for around 90% of world trade. In the past, paying bribes at ports to pass through customs was perceived as normal behavior, but such activities resulting in higher operational costs lead to increasingly stricter national and international anti-corruption regulations being put in place.

References

  1. "The Evolution of World Banks Procurement Framework.: Reform and Coherence for 21st Century" (PDF). Journal of Public Procurement. 16: 22–51. doi:10.1108/JOPP-16-01-2016-B002.
  2. Williams-Elegbe, Sope (2013). "The World Bank's Influence on Procurement Reform in Africa". African Journal of International and Comparative Law. 21: 95–119. doi:10.3366/ajicl.2013.0053.
  3. "Black People Have To Be Excellent In Order To Succeed In A Global Workplace". tribuneonlineng.com. Retrieved 2020-11-20.
  4. "Sope Williams" . Retrieved 2020-11-12.
  5. "African Procurement Law".
  6. "Public Procurement Lawmakers Advocate Reform to Check Corruption". Channels Television.
  7. "Public Procurement Research Group".
  8. "Opinion: Why this pandemic means leaders don't have to choose between the economy and people's lives" . The Independent. 2020-06-02. Archived from the original on 2022-05-24. Retrieved 2020-11-20.