Worsening corruption in many countries

The Panama Scandals refer to a corruption in the French Government in the 19th century that was linked to the building of the Panama Canal. A million francs were lost when the government took bribes in exchange for not telling the public that the Panama Canal Company was in huge financial trouble. 144 legislators were found to have been involved in the corruption.

The Saddam Hussein administration in Iraq was found guilty of accepting kickbacks and other illicit payments from 2,392 companies through intermediaries under the United Nations Oil-for-Food Programme.

These are popular examples of corruption in governments. Perceived as the most corrupt countries in the world today are Haiti, Myanmar and Iraq. This was reported by Transparency International (TI), a Berlin-based organization leading the fight against corruption, which hopes to create meaningful change towards a world free of corruption.

How is it possible to measure the increase or decrease of corruption? TI uses the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI), now the most commonly used measure in scientific research, famed for its accuracy. To form this index, foreign businessmen and analysts from 163 countries around the world are asked to give their opinion on how corrupt a country is. This is the greatest scope of any CPI to date. It scores countries on a scale from zero to ten, with zero indicating high levels of perceived corruption and ten indicating low level of perceived corruption. To balance subjectivity, this measurement is also based on the number of actual corruption cases. Consideration is made on the fact that laws and their enforcement vary significantly from country to country.

The increase in globalization, the growth of international trade and business that has opened up more opportunities for the payment of commissions and bribes and man’s increasing involvement in many activities make corruption seem to be at a greater magnitude than in the past.

Corruption, the misuse of public property for private gain is as old as government itself. Abdul Rahman Ibn Khaldun’s writings in the 14th century states that "the root of corruption was the passion for luxurious living within the ruling group". The prophet Jeremiah wrote that "the heart of man is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked". Furthermore, the concept of "doing wrong" is accepted and understood as simply "being oppressed", "being at a disadvantage" or a "lack of education". As a consequence, sin becomes acceptable and the norm rather than anathema.

As long as governments exist, corruption will stay. The important thing is public officials in developing countries recognize the consequences of corruption that impedes on their growth and development. The growing consensus on the importance of adopting good governance at all levels in an organization worldwide should spread and penetrate every individual’s consciousness, thus creating positive change. Better said than done.