Egypt's reforms in the economy seem to be applauded everywhere except by the people who work in it, Niveen Wahish reports The Egyptian government's anti-corruption efforts are not yet catching up with citizens' perceptions. Halawa or Ikramia, are familiar words to Egyptians. They refer to unjustified payments that citizens may need to make to receive a service at government offices. This is one of the most common forms of corruption that Egyptian citizens have to deal with in their day-to-day lives. In fact, corruption is one of the things which seem to be evading the government's reform efforts. According to the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) 2007, recently issued by Transparency International (TI), Egypt ranks 105th among 180 countries. Last year, it ranked 74 among 163 countries; i.e., the situation has actually deteriorated. But TI says that the country score is more important than ranking; on a scale of 0 to 10, 10 is perceived as the least corrupt, while 0 is viewed as highly corrupt. "A country's rank can change simply because new countries enter the index or others drop out," according to TI. "Comparisons with previous years should only be based on a country's score." Unfortunately, Egypt has dropped even more using this criterion; in 2006, it scored 3.3 and this year 2.9. Egypt's score is one of the worst even among Arab countries. Only Libya and Syria fared worse than Egypt. The position on the CPI is a stark contrast to the supposedly better rating and reports by several international organisations which have recently praised the Egyptian government's reform efforts. In an attempt to put a rosy face on things, Job Ogonda, TI's Programme Coordinator for Africa and the Middle East explained there is always a time-lag between reforms and effect. Because the reforms in Egypt have been undertaken recently, there is the possibility that it is too soon for their effect to be felt. He added that "there is also the possibility that because of the reforms, there is greater attention and sensitivity to corruption; thus the initial increase in perception of corruption as indicated in the CPI index." TI also noted that, "it is difficult to improve a CPI score over a short time period." The 2007 CPI is based on data primarily from the past two years, relating to perceptions that may have been formed even further in the past. This means that substantial changes in perceptions of corruption are only likely to emerge in the index over longer periods of time. Grasping at straws? There is no denying the problem. Deputy to the Minister of State for Administrative Development Ashraf Abdel-Wahab told Al-Ahram Weekly that despite Egypt being a pioneer in establishing monitoring and anti-corruption institutions, these institutions alone are not enough to eliminate corruption. "Low wages of government employees, the complexity of procedures and inefficient management" are aspects which make corruption possible. In his opinion, fighting corruption begins by implementing legislation that aims at simplifying processes and at the same time, effectively providing accountability and transparency within governmental organisations. "Some of these laws have been drafted and are in place now while others are not yet finalised," he said. "It takes time for the effect of these laws to reach the street." The CPI score is an indicator of the degree of public sector corruption as perceived by business people and country analysts. The surveys used in compiling the CPI pose questions relating to the misuse of public power for private benefit, such as the bribery of public officials, misappropriation of public funds or questions on the strength of anti-corruption policies. Abdel-Wahab acknowledges that Egyptian citizens will not feel the difference until their basic transactions with the government are implemented transparently. To achieve that, he said the Egyptian government is in the midst of a complete redefinition of its role. It intends to lose the role of the implementer and become a regulator instead. "Its role will be to monitor and fix the market when needed for better service to citizens and more development of society." He said the government's strategy towards fighting corruption focuses on devising new laws and regulations that help combat corruption. An example of the new laws is the draft civil service law ready to be submitted to the parliament this year. Simplifying processes and procedures to reduce the involvement of government employees in the application of the law is another goal. Abdel-Wahab gave the example of customs reform where categories were dropped from 24 to six to avoid discretionary decisions by Customs Authority employees. The same goes for the tax law and the establishment of new companies where the process dropped from 55 days to an average of three days. The government is also reverting to the use of information technology to reduce the interaction between citizens and the government. He gave the example of government services provided through the Egypt portal, www.egypt.gov.eg. Another example is the e-tender system, the electronic procurement tool of the government. All tenders will be published over the Internet and all subsequent steps will be implemented transparently over the Internet. The first phase of this project has been implemented and the full system should be operational early in 2008. The Citizen Relationship Management (CRM) is a new mechanism in the soft launch stage which aims to ensure that citizens' complaints are received, addressed and solved. Yet another effort, according to Abdel-Wahab, is the formation of a committee headed by the Minister of State for Administrative Development and including key public figures representing the various sectors of society. This committee will provide their input on fighting corruption and set acceptable levels of corruption in government organisations, awareness campaigns, and input to international organisations about our efforts in fighting corruption. The committee members have been selected and they will start their meetings by mid-November. The 2007 CPI drew on 14 different polls and surveys from 12 independent institutions. It excluded surveys which mix corruption with other issues, such as political instability, decentralisation or nationalism. According to Ogonda, Egypt's score is based on information from seven sources. These include business people residing in Egypt, business people outside Egypt, the UN Economic Commission for Africa and the World Bank. Somalia and Myanmar scored the lowest on the CPI at 1.4, while Denmark, Finland and New Zealand share the top position with a score of 9.4. Overall, the 2007 CPI covered a broader range of countries, including for the first time Afghanistan, Cape Verde, Comoros, Djibouti, Guinea-Bissau, Kiribati, Liberia, Maldives, Montenegro, Samoa, Sao Tome and Principe, Solomon Islands, Somalia, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Tonga and Vanuatu. This is due to the fact that three new sources of data were tapped by CPI, including the Asian Development Bank's Country Performance Assessment Ratings, the African Development Bank's Country Policy and Institutional Assessments and the Bertelsmann Transformation Index.
