The South African organization Open Democracy Advice Centre (ODAC) has announced the launch of the National Whistleblowing Week (logo pictured here), which will begin on October 17th. The main objective behind this initiative is to provide citizens with information about existing procedures to report corruption cases.
According to Alison Tilley, ODAC’s Executive Director, the premise behind the event is that the action of each individual in the fight against corruption matters and must be fostered. He also mentioned that the week comes at a moment of vulnerability of existing whistleblower protection legislation, with the pending passing of the Protection of State Information bill.
Read the full article National Whistleblowing Week Launched on ODAC’s website. More information on the event is available at www.blowthewhistle.org.za.
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The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Nigeria’s anti-graft agency, has begun operations to monitor four former governors, namely Danjuma Goje (Gombe), Gbenga Daniel (Ogun), Adebayo Alao-Akala (Oyo) and Akwe Doma (Nasarawa), and request their immediate arrest for involvement in money laundering and other financial crimes, according to a senior official.
Danjuma Goje has been accused of inflating a number of contracts while governor of Gombe State. In the case of Gbenga Daniel, several corruption allegations are being investigated, among which the illegal withholding of federal fund allocations to local governments.
Adebayo Alao-Akala was probed due to irregularities in the award of a book publishing contract and also other corruption accusations. Former governor Akwe Doma is accused of using backdated documents to siphon money from the state administration.
The investigations against them add to many other probes against state governors. The EFCC is already prosecuting 14 ex-governors on charges of corrupt enrichment.
For the full article on allafrica.com, please click here.
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In his first address to Parliament this Friday, Zambia’s new president Michael Sata (pictured here) pledged to take stronger measures to fight corruption. Mr. Sata said that his administration will seek to strengthen anti-corruption legislation and investigate corruption accusations against the previous government.
One of the measures mentioned in his speech was restoring abuse of office as a criminal offense, a legal provision that was repealed by the former government.
Mr. Sata has already began anti-corruption efforts by removing Godfrey Kayukwa as head of the Anti-Corruption Commission. His decision was motivated by accusations that Mr. Kayukwa, considered to be close to former President Rupiah Banda, had mishandled corruption investigations by the Commission.
Read the full article Zambia’s new president vows corruption crackdown on rnw.nl. The picture of Mr. Sata shown above is from africareview.com.
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The Centre for Media Studies (CMS) (logo pictured here) has released a new report about media coverage of corruption between 2005 and 2011. The study shows significant increase of coverage in those six years, especially in the case of television news channels, where coverage has increased eleven fold.
According to CMS director PN Vasanti, an important part of this dynamic took place between 2010 and 2011, when coverage by news outlets doubled. Particularly noteworthy was the impact of Anna Hazare’s anti-corruption campaigns and hunger strike on the overall coverage of corruption-related topics. During the period between July and September, when this story developed, coverage by TV news channels more than tripled.
For the full article on rapidtvnews.com, please click here. The picture above is from indiatvnews.com.
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The United Kindgom’s new anti-bribery legislation, which came into force last July, is being enforced for the first time against a London court official, who pleaded guilty today to resquesting and receiving a bribe and to a count of misconduct in public office.
Munir Patel admitted asking for a £500 bribe to remove a driving offense from an individual’s record at the courthouse where he worked. He shall be sentenced at another hearing scheduled in November.
The Bribery Act drew much attention at the time of its adoption, due to its being one of the world’s strictest anti-bribery legislation, as it foresees that companies are obligated to ensure internal controls to prevent bribery on their behalf in other countries.
Read the full article London Court Clerk Pleads Guilty in First Bribery Act Case on bloomberg.com. The picture above is from trust.org and is credited to Reuters/Sukree Sukplang.
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The second edition of the Financial Secrecy Index was published yesterday by the Tax Justice Network. The index scores and ranks 73 jurisdictions according to their level of banking secrecy. This year’s ranking shows that some OECD and EU members are among the most secretive jurisdictions.
Studies accompanying the index also show that recent efforts to reduce secrecy in the so-called tax havens have been unsuccessful in effectively fighting secrecy. Recent initiatives have focused in creating incentives for those countries to sign information-exchange agreements, but pitfalls to these approach include inedequate standards applied to the agreements and also room for secrecy jurisdictions to circumvent their commitment with new secrecy arrangements.
For the full article on the release of the index, please click here. The picture shown above is from cnbc.com.
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In the last months Brazil has shown signs that its society is no longer willing to accept corruption as it did in the past. At the same time, the current administration’s readiness in letting go high-level government officials accused of corruption demonstrates that it shares the population’s view.
Since the beginning of Dilma Rousseff’s term last January, the President already fired four ministers and many other top-level government employees. This anti-corruption surge is uncommon when compared to previous governments. Ms. Rousseff’s timely reaction to the scandals has even helped increase voters’ satisfaction with the government.
In the meantime, the number of anti-corruption demonstrations in major Brazilian cities has been increasing. Independence Day celebrations on September 7th were marked by protests in six cities, and on October 12th, a holiday dedicated to the country’s Patroness Saint, the pictured repeated itself in 18 cities.
According to Marcos Fernandes, an economist from the think thank Getulio Vargas foundation, the flourishing of anti-corruption activism reflects a new-found concern in the country’s growing middle class about how public resources are being used. He emphasized that this group is motivated mostly by their interest in practical issues such as the efficient provision of public services, and that they are becoming aware of their right to demand that from governments.
Gil Castello Branco, founder of a civil society watchdog group focused on transparency about government expenditures, also highlighted how recent brazilians’ realization that they are entitled to accountability from their representatives. He added that this civil society engagement is needed for concrete results in anti-corruption.
Read the full article Brazil takes hard line on corruption on hosted.ap.org. The picture shown above is from riotimesonline.com and is credited to Agencia Brasil/José Cruz.
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Three Ugandan ministers were charged with corruption yesterday, accused of fraud in contracting procedures for a $4.9 million infrastructure project executed for the 2007 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Kampala. Their indictment follows the arrest of former Vice President Gilbert Bukenya earlier this week, investigated for profiting from a $3.3 million contract for the procurement of limousines also related to the event.
The indictments were received with praise by the anti-corruption community in the country, considering the officials’ high level positions and their close connection to President Yoweri Museveni. Nevertheless, negative reactions to the case were also seen in the capital, particularly from the Buganda ethnic group, to which Mr. Bukenya belongs. They argued that the investigation against him is politically motivated.
For the full article on globalpost.com, please click here. The picture shown above is also featured in the article and is credited to Roberto Schmidt, AFP and Getty Images.
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An editorial published in The Observer called on United Kingdom’s Prime Minister David Cameron (pictured here) to fulfill a previous promise to fight corruption in lobbying through increased transparency about this activity, following the recent scandal that led to former Defense Secretary Liam Fox’s resignation.
According to the article, Cameron had already raised attention to corruption in the spurious deals between lobbyists and government officials 20 months ago, when he was still a Member of Parliament. Later on, in a speech as Prime Minister, he vowed to implement a compulsory registry system to function as a public record for all lobbying activities, including identity of clients and contact with officials.
The editorial makes use of the recent case of ex-Defense Secretary Liam Fox, who resigned after it became public that a close friend of his had been financed by companies with interest in the defense sector, to argue for the need to tighten regulation on lobbyism.
It also mentions that, in addition to corrupt deals that may emerge from the lobbying industry, increased transparency is needed to avoid that lobbying activities undermine democracy and the public interest.
Read the full article Honour the pledge to clean up lobbying, Mr Cameron on guardian.co.uk. The picture of Mr. Cameron featured above is from telegraph.co.uk and is credited to Getty.
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An article by Dany Mitzman takes a closer look into Telejato, a small Sicilian TV channel that has emerged as a single voice against the mafia in the region. Located in Partinico village close to Palermo, the TV station focuses on anti-mafia and corruption-related stories on its daily news bulletin.
Telejato’s success can be attributed to Pino Maniaci, the journalist in charge of the news program. He claims that all local residents, including mafia members, watch the bulletin. Mr. Maniaci is seen as a pioneer for courageously reporting about mafiosi and being the first to publicly disclose their identities. Such boldness has already costed him several life threats and a murder attempt, but he is proud to keep making an effort to counter the mafia power in Southern Italy.
For the full article on bbc.co.uk, please click here. The picture shown above is also featured in the article.
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Cuba’s recent anti-corruption investigations into relations between state businesses and foreign companies now hit the British investment fund Coral Capital and led to the arrest of its chief executive last week. The government has not yet disclosed the accusations against the companies.
The move against Coral Capital resembles measures to shut down two Canadian trading firms in the last couple of months. In their case, the arrest of Vice Minister for sugar Nelson Labrada suggested that the investigations were related to purchases from the Canadian companies, but the specific accusations were not made public.
Efforts to fight corruption in Cuba have been a priority in Raul Castro’s government since he took power in 2008. In 2009, he established a Comptroller-General’s Office to assist the government in its anti-corruption policies.
Read the full article Cuba probes British fund, arrests top executive on reuters.com. The picture featured above is from trust.org and is credited to Reuters/Enrique de la Osa.
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Colombia’s current administration is taking measures to fulfill its pledge to turn the fight against corruption into a main priority. However, for Miguel Francisco Prado, head of the government’s anti-corruption body, efforts to better monitor state funds and contracting procedures are needed to combat graft more effectivelly.
The government has so far focused on targeting high-profile corruption cases through investigations conducted by a special taskforce with top-level officials from enforcement agencies. According to Prado, coordination between different agencies has been working much better than expected.
This strategy appears to be successful as the number of politicians and government officials arrested on corruption charges increases. Recent examples are the conviction of a former intelligence chief for involvement with paramilitary groups and the recent arrest of Bogota’s mayor for fraud in public work contracts during his administration.
Nevertheless, Prado highlights that the government must focus more strongly on vulnerable areas, such as public contracting. He emphasizes the need to increase transparency and allow the public to better monitor the government’s procurement decisions. He also raises attention to the importance of monitoring the use of state resources, particularly in the oil and mining sector, which is similarly much vulnerable to corruption.
For the full article on trust.org, please click here.
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An article by Farzana Nawaz posted on Transparency International’s blog discusses the connection between corruption and gender-related issues. Some of the questions that the article addresses relate to whether women perceive corruption differently than men, and whether they are less susceptible to corruption as well.
Ms. Nawaz mentions that academic research has explored this topic only very recently, and that two main lines of research may be identified, one focusing on a potential positive anti-corruption effect of promoting women’s involvement in public administration, and the other on the specific impact of corruption on women and other vulnerable groups.
Some studies, for instance, have shown evidence that higher representation of women in government is associated with lower levels of corruption. Nevertheless, there are scholars who argue that this conclusion masks another mechanism, namely that the imbalance in gender relations determines women’s limited access to corruption networks.
For the full article on blog.transparency.org, please click here. The picture shown above is also featured in the article. The discussion continues on a longer article available here.
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The Kosovo Democratic Institute (logo pictured here) published last week a new report entitled Illegal Millions, which discusses the implications of a Law against Organized Crime and a Law on Confiscation of Property Acquired Illegally for the fight against corruption and organized crime in the country.
The report was launched at an event held on October 12th at AAB-riinvest, where students and representatives of several organizations participated in a roundtable on the subject Organized crime and illegally acquired property, an obstacle for the development of Kosovo.
During the discussion, some arguments were made in favor of the passing of further legislation to address those problems in Kosovo, and also of strengthening implementation of existing laws. The event was organized as part of the project Advocacy for the completion of the package of anti-corruption laws in Kosovo, supported by the British Embassy.
Read the full text Illegal millions – destroying the future on KDI’s website. The report Illegal millions is available in Albanian, English and Serbian.
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Zorana Marković, director of Serbia’s Anti-Corruption Agency, discussed in an interview last week the country’s accomplishments with its anti-corruption policies until now and the challenges that still remain and that shall be tackled by a new anti-corruption strategy for the next five years.
According to Ms. Marković, Serbia has been able to establish a strong legal framework to fight corruption and has put fundamental institutions in place to address the problem. Nevertheless, she pointed out that these institutions are still too weak to guarantee the enforcement of the existing anti-corruption legislation. Therefore the anti-corruption strategy for 2011-2016 to be presented to Parliament later this year focusses strongly on strengthening the already functioning structure in order to improve the government’s anti-corruption efforts.
Ms. Marković mentioned yet another important challenge that remains with regards to fighting corruption, namely the lack of whistleblower protection legislation. The proposition of such legislation will also be a priority for the anti-corruption agency in the near future.
Read the full article Serbia readies for long struggle against corruption on euractiv.com.
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The Czech Ministry of Education has been raided by the country’s anti-corruption police unit as part of an investigation on a large public tender for the delivery of a database to monitor public funds spent on research and development projects. The tender was still being prepared by the Ministry and was to be issued next month.
The investigators did not disclose what suspicions motivated the action. Analysts quoted by a national newspaper that reported the case mentioned that concerns about this tender might be related to a possible attempt to tailor the tender proposal in order to suit a certain provider, or to artificially raise the value of the contract.
A statement released by the Minister of Education, Josef Dobes, said that the police investigation refers to a contract from 2007 for the delivery of software services for research and development, which allegedly expired last September. Mr. Dobes claims that he opposed the extension of the old contract against the advice of ministry officials and decided to prepare a new tender for such services. He also declared that the tender is suspended until the investigation is concluded.
Read the full article Czech anti-corruption police raid Education Ministry on ceskapozice.cz. The picture shown above is also featured in the article.
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A new cooperation agreement has been established between the World Bank’s Integrity Vice-Presidency (INT) and the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) with the objective of combating fraud and corruption in development aid more effectively. This agreement represents the first step in implementing a decision taken by both institutions last May, during the 12th Conference of International Investigators in Washington, where they agreed to enhance operational cooperation between the two services.
The agreement regards mainly cooperation efforts related to exchange of information and the conduction of joint investigations and strategic analyses. It also foresees exchange of staff and cooperation in training activities.
Leonard McCarthy, World Bank’s Integrity Vice President, highlighted that both institutions already have a strong alliance based on their shared interest in fighting illegal activities.
Read the full press release World Bank and OLAF step up efforts to jointly combat fraud and corruption in development aid on europa.eu.
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Transparency International (TI) released last Wednesday its Bribe Payers Index (BPI), which ranks 28 leading exporting countries according to the likelihood of their companies to pay bribes abroad. The index is based on a survey with 3,000 business executives from developing and developed countries.
The index shows that firms from Russia and China are considered to be the most likely to bribe abroad, whereas companies from the Netherlands and Switzerlan are the least likely to pay bribes in foreign countries.
The survey results used to produce the index also revealed that bribery by firms in foreign countries is a widespread practice. They commonly take place between companies and public officials and aim at securing public tenders, avoiding regulation or influencing governments policies. Particularly vulnerable to bribery are the public works and construction sector and the extractive industries. The study also shows that companies are just as likely to bribe other companies.
An article by Deborah Hardoon posted on TI’s blog discusses the survey’s results into more detail and compares each country’s BPI scores with their Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) scores and their volume of exports and investments abroad, thereby contextualizing their economic impact.
Another post on TI’s blog also discusses Russia’s having the lowest score among all 28 countries. According to Elena Panfilova, TI Russia’s Director, the Russian government has adopted many pieces of legislation to fight corruption in recent years, but the main problem lies in insufficient enforcement of those laws.
Read TI’s press release Companies from emerging giants China and Russia most likely to bribe abroad on transparency.org. The picture featured above is from themalaysianinsider.com.
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A group of anti-corruption activists led by Anna Hazare has created much commotion around India’s anti-corruption bill, but now they are drawing attention for other reasons, such as internal disagreements and questionable moves by some of its members.
Since Mr. Hazare and other allies recently campaigned against India’s ruling party in a by-election in Haryana state, some of the group’s leading activists have withdrawn their support from the anti-corruption campaign. According to Rajendra Singh and PV Rajagopal, two activists that decided to leave Mr. Hazare’s team, internal democracy in his group is lacking.
Meanwhile, doubts have arisen regarding the so-called movement’s cohesion and representativeness. Mr. Hazare’s team has shown signs that it is not as well organized as everyone thought, and other groups in the Indian society have shown some degree of distrust in what Hazare stands for. The question that remains is whether his campaign will be able to keep enough support from the population for the months to come.
Read the full article Will India’s anti-corruption campaign implode? on bbc.co.uk. The picture shown above is also featured in the article and is credited to the Associated Press (AP).
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The Carter Center has launched a website to make information about the mining sector in the Democratic Republic of Congo available to the general public. The new webpage (www.congomines.org), which includes data on hundreds of contracts and payments related to mining activities, is part of the Center’s project to improve mining governance in the country.
The initiative aims at providing relevant actors and watchdogs with information about the sector which could not be accessed otherwise. It attempts to directly tackle the longstanding lack of transparency that has been characteristic of this sector, which represents a significant part of the country’s economy. This problem became particularly evident earlier this year, when secret deals on the property of former state-owned mines came to light.
Read the full article DR Congo mining transparency site launched on bbc.co.uk. The picture shown above is also featured in the article and is credited to AFP.
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Deputy Minister for Political Development Ali al-Selmi declared yesterday that the current Egyptian government is expected to ratify in the next days an anti-corruption law that restricts the political rights of individuals convicted for corruption-related crimes.
Following the revolution that led to the end of Hosni Mubarak’s rule in the country, the law was conceived as an attempt to keep Mubarak’s former allies, many of which are now facing corruption charges, of running in the next elections for Parliament, to take place on November 28th.
Read the full article Egypt to ratify anti-corruption law in days-minister on trust.org. The picture shown above is also featured in the article and is credited to Reuters.
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Sri Lanka’s Electoral authority announced today that it will make public the names of elected candidates who failed to disclose their assets after the last local elections on October 8th. According to Elections Commissioner Mahinda Deshapriya, those candidates shall also be investigated by the Commission to Investigate Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC).
Regulation for asset disclosure by elected candidates was implemented for the first time in this year’s elections. Based on a directive by the Electoral Commissioner, elected candidates were required to declare their assets and liabilities to local authorities before the end of October. However, the country still lacks legislation to make asset disclosure mandatory to all candidates.
Read the full text Members who have not declared their assets to be exposed on tisrilanka.org.
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Sudheendra Kulkarni (pictured here), former aide of prominent opposition leader LK Advani, has been arrested on accusations of involvement in the ‘cash for votes’ scandal that was uncovered in March. This is the sixth arrest related to the case, in which MP Amar Singh is believed to have offered cash to other legislators in exchange from their abstention in a 2008 confidence vote in Parliament.
According to the police, Mr. Kulkarni is believed to have planned the scheme and to have approached Mr. Singh in order to convince him to take part in it. Mr. Kulkarni claims that he persuaded Mr. Singh, a member of a coalition party, to offer bribes to MPs in the opposition, but his ultimate objective was to expose corruption within the government.
For the full story on bbc.co.uk, please click here. The picture of Mr. Kulkarni is also featured in the article and is credited to Press Trust of India (PTI).
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Former Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel (pictured here) stated today that he intended to resign as Member of Parliament due to allegations of his association to the corruption scandal involving Telekom Austria. Schuessel’s resignation should be effective by the end of the week.
Schuessel was Chancellor between 2000 and 2007 and has been accused of involvement with slush fund payments from companies, among which Telekom Austria, to politicians during his government.
In a press conference, he claimed that his resignation was not an acknowledgement of wrongdoing, and said that it was necessary to allow investigations to proceed independently and without political influence.
For the full article on reuters.com, please click here. The picture of Mr. Schuessel portrayed above is from focus.de and is credited to Deutsche Presse Agentur.
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