(Ecofin Agency) - In an interview with News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on December 14, president of African Development Bank (AfDB) said Africa was losing up to $148 billion annually due to corruption.

“Africa loses about $148 billion a year because of corruption; Africa also loses 60 billion US dollars a year because of illegal capital flow,” he affirmed. “These are money that should be going into education, health, water and sanitation sectors; wherever you have massive corruption, development takes a back seat and slow things down,” added Mr. Adesina.

AfDB’s president also emphasized that African countries needed to adopt anti-corruption policies.

“Detecting corruption is important, but preventing corruption is also important. Therefore, it is in the interest of Africa to prevent corruption in order to boost economy and development across the continent,” he said.

Most African countries are poorly ranked on the latest corruption perception index dressed by Transparency International. At the bottom of this ranking are Guinea Bissau, Chad, Kenya and Nigeria.