MENA countries are stepping up efforts to fight corruption, Sherine Nasr reports Corruption is a phenomenon hard to eliminate because of its intrinsic characteristics: it is complex, secretive, usually lacks immediate victims to file reports, and comes in many forms that are difficult to compare or rank. Last week, Cairo hosted the 11th annual conference on fighting corruption organised by the Arab Administrative Development Organisation (ARADO) together with Transparency International (TI) and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). "Our first responsibility is to make our government systems resistant to corruption," said Christian Vergez, head of reform of the public sector division, OECD, adding that public governance is about building mechanisms that help prevent corruption. "Administrative simplification, public financial management, electronic government, open and inclusive policymaking and procurement, and civil service systems are tools to promote good public governance and eliminate corruption," Vergez said. One of the OECD's foremost tasks is to elaborate guidance frameworks for institutional measures to identify areas vulnerable to corruption. "Today, particular attention should be given to risk areas linked to the financial crisis, namely: lobbying, public procurement and conflicts of interest," he said. But is it possible to measure the effectiveness of corruption prevention mechanisms? The OECD is focussing on developing benchmarks. "The organisation has developed a number of projects aimed at fostering good governance." A good example is the "Government at a Glance" project, which has indicators on whistle blowing, conflict of interest disclosure, and public procurement. "Through this project, we are striving towards measuring the outputs and outcomes of immunity and corruption prevention efforts," said Vergez. Through dialogue with countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), the OECD has been able to gather evidence on how corruption prevention mechanisms are working in practice. So- called Joint Learning Studies is a methodology specifically developed for MENA countries in order to help them modernise their integrity management and measure progress. One crucial factor for the prevention of corruption is political leadership. "In different countries, political commitment has proved to be the most important factor in eliminating corruption. Cabinet members should set a good example. A national strategy to fight corruption and means to implement it is unforeseeable if the political will is lacking," said Vergez. Some 15 MENA countries, including Egypt, are now signatory to the UN Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC) which has been ratified by 140 countries and entered into force in 2005. The convention is recognised as the most powerful legal instrument to combat corruption. According to Sana Al-Attar, a policy analyst at the OECD, there has been common recognition among MENA countries that corruption undermines economic prosperity. Comprehensive national strategies have been developed to fight the phenomenon. They include common components such as legislative reform, new institutional frameworks, and efforts to reinforce the role of institutions in society. "MENA countries are in an advanced stage in designing programmes to fight corruption, but they continue to face challenges," said Al-Attar, adding that these challenges are manifested in the need to combine value-based and rule- based approaches, strengthening human and institutional capabilities, and promoting transparency and access to information. "There have to be laws promoting easy access to information and to make government more accountable for its actions and decisions." Many effective anti-corruption measures have been designed by TI, which has developed a number of assessment tools to measure the scale of the problem and to assess what works and what doesn't in fighting corruption. Among these is the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) that assesses corruption amongst officials in a wide range of countries. Countries in the index score on a scale from 0 (most corrupt) to 10 (clean of corruption). "The index gives a snapshot of how politicians in any country perceive corruption," said Farzana Nawas, TI programme coordinator, adding that according to the CPI 2009, New Zealand and Denmark have been identified as the least corrupt countries with 9.4 and 9.3 points respectively, while Iraq and Sudan were worst at 1.5 each. The Global Corruption Barometer (GCP) is another TI tool for measuring corruption. "This is a household survey to assess public opinion on corruption. It doesn't provide a ranking of countries; however, it is believed to be good feedback on the extent of corruption as perceived by the public," said Nawas. Other solutions at a country level include the National Integrity System (NIS) that is based on 13 pillars that cover the legislature, judiciary, the executive, civil society, the business community and the media, among other domains.
