Corruption increased globally over the last three years as more people paid bribes in countries across the world, according to a Transparency International survey.
A quarter of 91,500 people surveyed reported paying a bribe to an institution or for services from health to education to tax authorities in the last year, Berlin-based Transparency said in the 2010 Global Corruption Barometer report on its website.
Some 60 percent of people believe corruption has risen since 2007, according to the report, which covered respondents from 86 countries and territories.
“Corruption is insidious,” Huguette Labelle, chairwoman of the monitor group, said in the report. “The good news is that people are ready to act.”
The biggest increases in petty bribery were in Chile, Colombia, Kenya, Macedonia, Nigeria, Poland, Russia, Senegal and Thailand.
More than half of Sub-Saharan Africans surveyed paid a bribe in the past year -- the highest in the report -- compared with 23 percent in Latin America, 19 percent in the Western Balkans and Turkey and 5 percent in European Union Countries and North America.
Danes reported no bribery followed by Norway with 1 percent of respondents reporting paying bribes. Nearly 90 percent of Liberians questioned had paid a bribe, the highest of all countries, followed by Uganda with 86 percent, according to the report.
An October poll by Transparency found that Denmark was the least corrupt country, followed by New Zealand, Singapore, Finland and Sweden. The most corrupt nations were Somalia, Afghanistan, Burma, Iraq, Uzbekistan, Sudan and Turkmenistan.
Talking Point
Corruption is the most talked about global issue, according to a separate poll by the state-funded British Broadcasting Corp. Around 20 percent of more than 13,300 people across 26 countries surveyed had discussed corruption and greed with friends and family over the past month.
Majorities in all but four of the countries surveyed rated corruption as a very serious problem with Brazilians, Egyptians, Colombians, Filipinos and Kenyans most likely to rate it as “very serious,” the BBC said in a report on its website.
Corruption was rated among the most serious issues in China, the U.S., Russia and India. In Europe, Italians were the most concerned about corruption, the broadcaster found.
Environmental pollution, terrorism, human-rights abuses and the rising cost of food and energy were rated as the next most serious issues.
Police Bribes
Bribes to the police have almost doubled since 2006 and more people report paying bribes to the judiciary and for registration and permit services than five years ago, Transparency said.
Eight of 10 people surveyed said political parties are corrupt, and half of the people saw their government’s action to stop corruption as ineffective.
“Governments should do more to identify corruption risks in basic services and to protect their citizens,” Labelle said. “Better whistleblower protection and greater access to information are crucial.”
Almost half of all respondents said they paid bribes to avoid problems with the authorities and a quarter said it was to speed up processes, according to the survey.
Seven out of 10 said they would report a corrupt act if they witnessed one, though this drops to around half if they are the victim.
To contact the reporters on this story: Maria Ermakova in London at mermakova@bloomberg.net; Christopher Spillane in London at cspillane3@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Colin Keatinge at ckeatinge@bloomberg.net
No comments:
Post a Comment