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Contributions from
the Column
Studies and reports
Failed states – liberal protectorates as answer?
Ten years of the Cairo Action Programme – no reason to celebrate
Transparency International: corruption in poor countries serious
Services: privatisation is not the real answer
“Some of the criticism directed at the IMF is not valid”
11/2003 |
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[ Corruption Perceptions Index 2003 ]
Transparency International: corruption in poor countries serious
Nine out of 10 developing countries urgently need practical support to fight corruption. Transparency International (TI) draws this conclusion from its Corruption Perceptions Index 2003, which it presented to the public at many places around the world on October 7. “The rich countries must provide practical support to developing country governments that demonstrate the political will to curb corruption,” said TI Chairman Peter Eigen when presenting the Index to the Foreign Press Association in London. On the Index scale of 0 (highly corrupt) to 10 (highly clean), 90 per cent of the developing countries scores less than five points, and 50 per cent even less than three points. The latter are regarded as especially corrupt. As in previous years, Chile (rank 20) and Botswana (30) score best out of the developing countries. Both lead the EU member countries Italy (35) and Greece (50). Namibia has also done relatively well to maintain a ranking of 41. Germany improved its score from a poor ranking of 20 in 2002 to 16 this year, and increased its Index value by 0.4 to 7.7 points. Like last year, Nigeria and Bangladesh take the final two places.
Eigen said the donor countries and international financial institutions should take a firmer line, “stopping financial support to corrupt governments and blacklisting international companies caught paying bribes abroad”. He also called on the WTO to launch negotiations on a multilateral framework agreement on Transparency in Government Procurement (TGP). This was one of the so-called ‘Singapore issues’ which most of the developing countries rejected at the WTO ministerial meeting in Cancún. “For less developed countries, it is in their own interests to introduce transparency measures in public procurement because the waste of their own scarce resources is at stake. If corruption in procurement is not contained, poverty will grow,” Eigen said. (ell)
Further information on the Internet:
www.transparency.org/cpi/index.html#cpi
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