By Mohamed Jaward Nyallay
The 2019 Global Corruption Barometer has shown that 52% of people in Sierra Leone paid bribe for public services. This means that one out of every two people have paid bribe to access public services sometime in the last four years.
The figure is an increase of from 2015 which was 41%. It also reflects how much the country’s anti-graft body must contend with in the fight against corruption.
In Sierra Leone paying bribe is a corruption offence. Going by this standard just over half of the population have been involved in corruption. The number could be much higher if the recipients of those bribes are factored in the statistics.
The Global Corruption Barometer is done by Transparency International in partnership with Afrobarometer, two leading organizations in gathering data on corruption.
This report shows that people paid bribes in public schools and public health facilities more than any other place.
Bribery increased in public schools from 20% in 2015 to 33%, according to the report. Bribery in public health centers increased by half in the last four years, from 25% in 2015 to 50% in 2019.
The Police, who have led this index for quite a well, did remarkably well in reducing the rate of bribery involving its members, according to this report. r Bribery within the force reduced from 64% in 2015 to 39% in 2019, it shows.
Assistant Superintendent Brima Kamara, Director of Police Media relations at the Sierra Leone Police, said the improvement is a result of internal mechanisms the force has put in place to control bribery and other forms of corruption.
“We have been tightening our internal control mechanism. We have been working as well with other bodies in fighting corruption. We will continue to monitor our officers and put deterrent in place,” Kamara said at the launch of the report.
“The figures are still in the 30s, so we will keep working to reduce it to the barest minimum,” he added.
The Director of Public Education and Outreach at the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC), Patrick Sandy spoke about the challenges they face as an institution, noting that public participation is as important as the work of the Commission.
“We have our Pay No Bribe platform, where we encourage citizens to report incidence of bribery. It is just that maybe they are not reporting, but rather they are engaged in situations when it comes to situations of this nature. The infrastructure is there for us to take actions and we are still taking actions,” he said.
Transparency International’s study is a perception survey. This year they interviewed 47,000 people in 35 countries across Africa.
The data on Sierra Leone was compiled by Campaign for Good Governance, a civil society organization and Itascap, a financial research firm.
The launch of the report coincides with the African Anti-Corruption Day, which the continent has observing since last year.
Despite the grim statistics on bribery, the report showed that perception about increase in corruption in Sierra Leone dropped significantly from 70% in 2015 to 43% in 2019. This latest figure is below the average on the continent.
On average, 59% of people in Africa believe their government is not doing enough in fighting corruption, it shows.
The ACC has been making significant strides in the fight against corruption. Since the appointment of Francis Ben Kaifala as Commissioner in June last year, the commission has recovered more than Le9 billion in stolen money.
But despite this progress, the Commission says there is need for people to use existing infrastructure to report corruption. Statistics from the report show that 53% of people do not believe that ordinary people can make a difference in fighting corruption, that is more than half of the population.
Sandy said this shows there is a need for more outreach.
“We will continuously engage and let people know about the infrastructure. There is need for more outreach. The infrastructure is so important because it helps us track corruption. This infrastructure we are talking about collect data on key institutions,” he said.
The Government of Sierra Leone has placed the fight against corruption as one of its top priorities. Currently, there are three commissions of inquiry investigating corruption in the former administration of President Ernest Bai Koroma.
The report was launched at the offices of the Institute for Governance Reform (IGR), which takes over from CGG as the representative of the Afrobarometer starting this year.
IGR’s Executive Director, Andrew Lavalie, noted that despite the “gloomy” picture of the situation across the continent, there is reason for Sierra Leone to celebrate.
“There is still massive corruption in Africa but we have done better," he said at the report launch.
He also noted that a little more work needs to be done, especially in light of the high perception of corruption.
"You have made gains but the number of people who think corruption is on the increase is still high,” he said.
© 2019 Politico Online
