2013-12-12Mathias Haufiku RUNDU - Anti-Corruption Commission Director, Paulus Noa, has slammed Transparency International for presenting perceived corruption levels among Namibians, which “fail to reflect the actual situation on the ground.” “The index is not factual at all, they do not even visit the countries to see what efforts are being made to curb corruption,” charged Noa. Noa said this in reaction to the 2013 Corruption Perception Index (CPI) released recently by Transparency International and that ranked Namibia the 57th least corrupt country in the world. Last year Namibia was ranked 58 out of 176 countries with a score of 48 out of 100. The CPI measures perceived levels of public sector corruption, ranking countries on a scale from 0 to 100, where zero is highly corrupt and 100 is very clean. Noa claims that Transparency International is the only international civil society organisation that makes a perception assessment by collecting data from institutions like the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. “This data was meant for something, but Transparency International wants to use it to gauge the level of corruption in a country. You will see that they look at factors such as the governance system, economic performance, political stability and the security situation in a country... based on that they put data together and [create a] perception,” he said. Noa said Transparency International never approached the ACC for inputs or any other officials or institutions in the country. “They do not even conduct research to see which legal frameworks have been implemented to end corruption, therefore, you can never say that their perception is accurate,” he said. Noa also accused Transparency International of favouring western countries when it comes to the rankings at the expense of African countries. “Germany is one of the countries that is said to be least corrupt, but who does not know that there is a lot of corruption, in the form of bribery, taking place in Germany?” questioned Noa. He feels the index should premise its focus on the efforts being made to fight graft, instead of looking at accountability. “For them to give you a good ranking, it seems you must be in their camp,” he charged. According to Noa Transparency International is an international civil society organisation and this is their way of lobbying for funds from potential donors. Denmark and New Zealand are in joint first place with 91 points as the least corrupt countries while Somalia, North Korea and Afghanistan are tied at the bottom of the list as the most corrupt countries scoring a mere eight points each. According to the index, Namibia is the seventh least corrupt country on the African continent. Only Botswana, Cape Verde, Seychelles, Rwanda, Mauritius and Lesotho are less corrupt than Namibia on the continent. By Mathias Haufiku 2013-12-12Mathias Haufiku
