In January, when the pockets of Nigerians are at their emptiest levels, Josephine Ugwu, a cleaner at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport Lagos, picked a bag in a toilet containing N12 million ($60,000), and handed it over to the authorities.
Today, several news websites reported that Josephine has been rewarded with a 92 percent wage increase. This means her pay has jumped from N7,800 to N15,000 per month. This is wonderful good news for the cleaner! But before you celebrate with her, check this out.
With her old salary, Josephine earned N251 ($1.3) per day, enough to buy a loaf of bread and a 35 gram sachet of milk. With her 92 percent raise, she gets N483 ($2.4), a day, this can now purchase a ‘plate of food’ at a local restaurant. Thus, with $2.4—barely a dollar above the World Bank’s categorization of extreme poverty, Josephine’s reward has succeeded in ‘upgrading’ her status from ‘very very poor’ to ‘very poor.’
If Josephine had kept the N12m, check out what would have happened:
First, she would not have had to work again. If she lives by her new N15,000 monthly wage, which is N180,000 ($902) a year, she could be paying herself with the N12 million for the next 66 years and seven months. This is the positive.
So what is the negative consequence?
Actually, in the ‘normal’ Nigerian setting, there is really no negative consequence. This is apart from the judgement of personal conscience and the teachings of religion. But keeping these aside, as many Nigerians already do, Josephine would have faced little or no repercussion if she had kept the N12 million. The inefficiency of Nigeria’s law enforcement agencies mean very little would have come out of any ‘police investigation,’ ask the Bola Ige family.
There would have also been no negative public perception of her immoral act. In a country where corrupt politicians and shady businessmen are adored and worshipped, Josephine’s loot could even fetch her a chieftaincy title.
But Josephine did not take the money. She did the right thing and returned it to the owner. So how did Nigerians react to her action?
Does honesty pay in Nigeria? I think Yes… but the reward is in heaven.
