In what has now been one of the most ambitious public opinion surveys of corruption in the Pacific, the official launching of the first ever Pacific component of the Transparency International Global Corruption Barometer (GCB), has now underscored a silver lining, in what is an otherwise burgeoning trend of corruption across the Pacific.
Representing the views of over 6,000 people across ten countries and territories including Papua New Guinea. The Pacific GCB is now the most extensive public opinion survey on corruption ever gathered in the region.
While most of the data from the GCB painted a generally grim picture of the status quo of governance and corruption in the pacific, over 70 per cent of respondents expressed that ordinary people are able to help fight corruption in their communities. While 60 per cent stated that they felt their government was doing a good job in combatting corruption.
Perhaps one of the most worrying trends reflected in the GCB data was the rising prevalence of corruption in the business sector (45 per cent of people surveyed indicated that they saw corruption in the business sector increasing) and specifically where this intersected with public finance management, through government contracts.
“The process of public spending has been a particular concern for TIPNG since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Especially with many countries in the region (including PNG) having resorted to exempting COVID-19 emergency procurement from existing public finance accountability mechanisms. In order to keep pace with the pandemic,” said TIPNG Chief Executive Officer Arianne Kassman.
“Our foremost concern in this regard has been that while these measures may have been warranted by exceptional circumstances, we have not seen a return to established norms, or the creation of new processes to accommodate for recurrences in the future. The longer it takes to accommodate for this lapse in accountability, the more exposed we are to corruption and those who might seek to exploit this
vulnerability,” she said.
While the TI movement has made several recommendations to pacific island nations from the data collected in the GCB, governments must take heed of the appetite for greater accountability and transparency. Visit this link for more info https://www.transparency.org/en/gcb/pacific/pacific-2021
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