THE EFFECTS OF BANK FRAUD IN NIGERIAN ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT (21ST CENTURY EXPERIENCE)

Fraud is gradually becoming rampant and a daily occurrence in our banking industry, while the bank management is busy working out means of detecting, checking fraud, the fraudsters on the other end are busy designing new method of circumventing those measures in conjunction with some dishonest bank staff. It should be pointed out that effect destabilizes banks not only that, hinders growth of banks. Hence we have good numbers of banks that were distress, acquired by other banks and merged with other banks in the country in the present 21st century. The study adopted the following theories: Differential Association theory, Social learning theory, the theory of work place, the theory of hyper motivation, the anomie theory, the theory of fraud. The research also adopted the design methodology, the population of the study was 874 people from five different banks and the sample size was 120, the study also made use of the clustered and stratified random sampling and questionnaires was used as the primary method of data collection, this study used the Statistical Package for Special Sciences (SPSS) as the method of data analysis. In justifying the validity and reliability of the instrument, Spearman’s Rank Order correlation statistics was used. The findings of this study saw the menace of bank fraud which ranges from falsification of entries, forgery of signature of account holders, spurious letter of credit, cash theft by bank cashiers, telex fraud, collusion in issuance of loans, manipulation of financial data, misrepresentation of automated teller machine (ATM), to mention but a few. The project also evaluated various forms of fraud and malpractice that can be in existence, relating to this project in examining the problems, the researcher used both primary and secondary data. In conclusion, the researcher believes that this study has somehow achieved its predetermined aims and objectives by identifying various ways by which frauds and malpractice and possible ways of preventing them. Finally, this study gave the following recommendations: that Promotion should be based on hardworking, dedication, punctuality, faithfulness to duty and length of useful service and not in tribalism or quota system. Management should come to the help of their staff financially, such as giving them staffs’ loans and medical expenses, wherever they have pressing family problems. It is mostly the duty of inspection and internal control department to investigate fraud and malpractice in banks. Men of undoubted integrity should be posted to this department as should not be use as dumping group to frustrate staff.