POOR CORPORATE GOVERNANCE AND ITS CONSEQUENCES ON THE NIGERIAN BANKING SECTOR

The anxiety over the current banking crisis in Nigeria is understandable. This is borne out of the fact that the economic development of any country is directly tied to its banking sector. The effectiveness and efficiency with which the banks perform their intermediary roles between the surplus and deficit spending units of the economy determines to a very large extent the prosperity of any nation. Corporate governance is systematic and formalized manners of ensuring that top management represented by the board of directors do not make decision making powers occasioned by management and ownership separation to pursue personal interests at the expense of other stakeholders. This study made use of structured questionnaire to elicit responses from conveniently selected respondents comprising of investment experts, academics, banks customers, public and policy analysts with in Lagos metropolis. It was hypothesized and the study confirmed that poor governance culture and supervisory laxities were majorly responsible for the current banking crises. The study recommended an adherence to the execution of the tenets of good corporate governance in Nigerian banking sector and actions contrary to this should be dealt with appropriately by bringing offenders to book irrespective of their status in the society.