GHANA 2ND MOST CORRUPT – SAYS TI SURVEY

Posted on: www.dailyguideghana.com

By William Yaw owusu

Tuesday, December 02, 2015

Tansparency International (TI), a global anti-corruption body, says Ghana is the second worst performing country in the fight against corruption, making the country second after South Africa in the corruption perception index on the continent.

South Africa, which scored 83, is ranked ahead of Ghana (76) and Nigeria (75) as countries whose governments are perceived to be weak in the fight against corruption.

Burkina Faso (28), Mali (31) and Ivory Coast (32) were the three countries whose governments were perceived to have fought corruption effectively in Africa in the last one year.

The ‘People and Corruption: Africa Survey 2015 Global Corruption Barometer’ of the TI released yesterday in Berlin, Germany, is a further indictment on the Mahama-led National Democratic Congress (NDC) government and shows clearly that the government is losing the fight against rampant corruption in the country.

The government has only been paying lip service to the fight against corruption, with the latest decision by the government to award less corrupt individuals in the public sector.

Ghana may not fare better next year owing to the recent revelation of massive corruption in the judiciary as uncovered by Anas Aremeyaw Anas.

Executive Summary

In the executive summary, the report said Ghana is one of the countries in Africa where majority of the public perceive corruption to be on the rise and that the government is failing to curb the canker.

“A majority of Africans perceive corruption to be on the rise and think that their governments are failing in their efforts to fight corruption; and many also feel disempowered as regards to taking action against corruption. In Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Liberia and Ghana citizens are the most negative about the scale of corruption in their countries,” TI said.

75m Bribes

“Shockingly, we estimate that nearly 75 million people have paid a bribe in the past year – some of these to escape punishment by the police or courts, but many also forced to pay to get access to the basic services that they desperately need.

“When comparing the results of the different countries that were surveyed, people living in South Africa, Ghana and Nigeria were the most likely to say that they think corruption has risen in the 12 months prior to when the survey was conducted.”

The report underscored, “In these countries three-quarters or more of respondents said corruption has increased either somewhat or a lot,” adding, “The three countries which had the smallest proportion of citizens saying corruption has risen were Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire and Mali – less than one-third of respondents answered that corruption has increased in the past 12 months.

Sample Size

The Afrobarometer Survey covered 43,143 respondents in 28 countries across Sub-Saharan Africa between March 2014 and September 2015 and it sought to find out their experiences and perceptions of corruption in their respective countries.

According to the report, “Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea, Kenya and Uganda also have bribery rates that are far higher than the regional average.”

It disclosed that Ghana scored 36 per cent in the number of respondents who said they paid bribes using the public service system in the last 12 months.

It said bribery is reported as rampant across all of the public services in Cameroon, Ghana, Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone, where all the services have much higher bribery rates than the regional average.

Way Forward

As a way forward, the anti-corruption body said governments should “strengthen and enforce legislation on corrupt business people and anti-money laundering to curb the high volume of illicit flows from the continent. This could address the negative perception of business if those profiting are held to account.”

It called on governments to establish right to information and whistleblower protection legislations to facilitate the role of civil society in making public institutions more transparent, accountable and corruption-free.