BY  MONSOUR OLOWOOPEJO

Lagos—Former President of Georgia, Mr. Mikheil Saakashvili yesterday, explained how power situation and corruption ravaged his country before year 2004, when he was elected as President, which he said was worse than the present situation in Nigeria.

Saakashvili, who spoke at the 7th Lagos Economic Summit, Ehingbeti 2014, lamented that corruption was so prevalent in his country then that nothing was done by government officials without demanding bribe.

According to him; “Security officers especially the Police were collecting bribes on the streets and prison guards were permanently placed on salaries by criminals.

“We had crime rate, which was one of the highest in the world. And this was at 80 percent. Also, we had corruption, which was one of the highest in the world.”

He explained that he had to adopt radical approach to governance by sacking all those in the Georgian Police Force as well as all those in the customs and replaced them with fresh blood.

The former President said many thought that sacking the entire police force would engender high level of crime, but that ironically there was drastic reduction in the level of crimes.

According to him “Also, we scrapped some of the agencies that we discovered weren’t functioning in the country.