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The Nigerian education Minister is accused for having given bribes to parliamentarians so they increase the budget for his ministry. Arrested last Thursday, he was released five days later. The President has asked the Minister to resign. The government of Olusegun Obasanjo, which has promised to fight against corruption, has not yet managed to take away Nigeria's reputation as a corrupt country.

Nigeria's former education minister and six others have gone on trial charged with corruption. The former minister is accused of paying a $400,000 bribe to parliament to ensure the passing of an inflated budget for his department.

A new approach in development aid could be fuelling corruption. Western countries are testing the "budget support model", whereby funds are given directly to the government in order to reduce poverty. A report claims that up to June 2002, government expenditure was not supported by the correct documentation.

In Uzbekistan, many schools lack basic supplies and teachers sometimes resort to asking pupils for cash to supplement meager budgets. The Uzbek Uchitel Uzbekistana newspaper in August 2007 reported that even the most experienced elementary and secondary-school teachers earn less than $100 a month. In 2007, Transparency International ranked Uzbekistan fifth from bottom in its corruption index of 180 nations surveyed.

A report from Fundación Grupo Civico Etica y Transparencia (EyT) was elaborated to show the results of the "Corruption Prevention in the Education System project". After monitoring large construction contract processes related to the maintenance of schools in rural areas, EyT found that a significant part of the Ministry of Education's public contracting budget had irregularities. It advised the Ministry to strengthen the quality control of materials and conduct regular internal audits.

The problems of corruption are immediate; one cannot wait possibly ten to fifteen years before these students finally make their entry into job market. Moreover, what will you do when your very education system is corrupted? Cases of fake certificates are only the tip of the iceberg of corruption happening in the education sector. Nepal's largest budgetary outlay is now made in the education sector.

At least seven students died and 39 were injured when their university building was caught on fire. The accident occurred because the university, short of money, had rented out the building's lower three floors as office space, blocking the fire exits. As the chief of fire control of the Russian Federation Ministry of Emergency Situation, declared, the university lacked fire alarms, so the emergency services were notified too late.