Introduction Corporate governance involves promoting corporate accountability, fairness and transparency. OECD (1999) defined corporate governance as “the system in which the business corporate is controlled; corporate governance structure specifies the distribution of rights and responsibilities among different participants in the corporation, including board managers, share holders and other stake holders” (OECD, 2005, p. 1). Corporate governance defines the rules and procedures in reaching corporate decisions and affairs. This way, it lays down appropriate structures in which a company’s objectives are set, with clearly spelled out means of attaining the objectives (EIU, 2002). Corporate governance has become the main-stream concern in most corporate board rooms and in many academic meetings. The events which have heightened discussions on corporate governance are the 1998 financial crisis in Brazil, Russia and Asia due to poor corporate behavior affecting the entire nation’s economies. This was followed by the 2001 crisis due to corporate scandals in the U.S. and Europe. The private sector, being the major contributors in most nations’ economies and other development projects such as market liberalizations, has enhanced the need to attain good corporate governance. This paper traces the importance of corporate governance and its dimension in risk management. It endeavors to highlight the role of corporate governance in defining the risks for public corporations. Risk Management A good corporate governance structure establishes the mechanisms to attain accountability between the executives and the shareholders so as to protect the interests of the various stakeholders. Various means of improving corporate governance described by Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) (2002) include regularly meeting non-executives to examine their performance and establish areas they feel inadequately explored by the management. Secondly, risk management should be focused on. Ill-judged management decisions on risk management are usually the roots of failure. They should also audit performance of the board and the non executives (EIU, 2002). Risk management refers to the processes organizations address methodologically the potential events and consequences (threats) with the aim of achieving sustained benefits. No corporation is risk free. Risk management consists of 3 Rs namely returns, risks and ruins. Risk management increases the probability of succeeding and reduces the uncertainty of an organization’s failure. The process should be continuously running throughout the organization’s strategy implementation. A good risk management should be addressed methodologically covering the organization in the present and in the future. The management should be integrated with the organizational culture and policies. Risk management should translate the strategy into tactical and operational objectives, which assigns overall responsibility and those that support accountability, performance and efficiency (AIRMIC, 2002). Effective Plan for Risk Management Every organization requires a set of management programs and organizational frame work to identify and evaluate risks associ