Gonzi, Transparency International, Greece and corruption

Article from Malta Independent.

“In Malta we must have broken an all-time record, in the sense that in these past 30 years or so, hardly ever has a politician been nailed for corruption while every attempt at transparency, be it through state party political financing or else an effective reform of the toothless anti-Corruption Commission has always been evidently kept on the slow burner by the Gonzi administration”

What worries me most – apart from the fact that we seem to be constantly faring badly in the Transparency International index – is that whenever such an index is published, Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi tends to dismiss such a classification lightly by claiming that these are mere perceptions and not necessarily based on fact.

A Nationalist groupie writing in a Sunday newspaper recently even had the cheek to claim that such perceptions were based on the false rumours and unfounded allegations perpetrated by the Labour Opposition.

In other countries, particularly the Nordic states – be they EU members or else countries like Norway – heads invariably roll when specific cases are highlighted.

In Malta we must have broken an all-time record, in the sense that in these past 30 years or so, hardly ever has a politician been nailed for corruption while every attempt at transparency, be it through state party political financing or else an effective reform of the toothless anti-Corruption Commission has always been evidently kept on the slow burner by the Gonzi administration.

While the local media and even Parliament have recently focused at some length on the Greek financial crisis as well as on its likely spill over on the fate of the euro as well as the possible domino effect in other eurozone countries, perhaps very little emphasis has been made on the pivotal role corruption has had in actually bringing about such a crisis.

I was indeed shocked to learn last March that according to the very same watchdog that Gonzi is habitually inclined to ridicule or ignore – Transparency International – corruption cost Greece about $1 billion last year, with state hospitals, urban planning and tax offices being considered as the most corrupt institutions in the country.

The report came a day after the Greek Prime Minister Papandreou identified graft as a root cause of the country’s fiscal crisis.

Costas Bakouris, head of the anti-corruption watchdog’s Greek office, said the findings went some way towards explaining the poor state of Greece’s public finances.

Papandreou not only identified corruption but also impunity as a key cause of Greece’s debt crisis.

In recent years Greece has dropped several notches on Transparency International’s corruption index and continues to rank as the most corrupt state in the eurozone.

Regardless of whether Malta will end up suffering from contagion – which I sincerely hope will never ever be the case – I think that any administration is duty bound as of now to take effective and corrective measures to ensure that we have anti-corruption measures in place.

The fact that certain sections of the PN leaning media as well as the Gonzi administration itself remained in two minds whether to ignore Joseph Muscat’s 15-point plan to fight corruption or else to subject them to ridicule, proves one important point.

That possibly out of fear that he might be sitting on a can of worms, Gonzi might have decided to take the easier but counter productive route of letting sleeping dogs lie, opting for inaction instead of taking the lead and resorting to pro-activity.

Although the Greek Socialists’ record in the past might not have been spotless, the international media seems to be in agreement that the high level of corruption and cronyism that is now sinking Greece was mainly fuelled under the former Conservative government with whom the Gonzi and EFA administrations always had the best of relations.

One could have hardly expected any better from the former Greek administration in fighting corruption (or rather being reluctant to do so) when one bears in mind that Greece was at the time as a government quite ‘creative’ with its financial statements and submissions of financial data and statistics to the EU.

A leading international banker recently remarked that apart from the fact that the state in Greece is accountable for a huge portion of the economy; a Greek civil servant who is efficient, honest and diligent is an exception – thus proving a very depressing rule.

Navigating this Greek bureaucracy, a cause and effect of corruption and cronyism, became a bit easier with ‘little envelopes’ sized to fit high denomination euro notes.

While Malta remains relatively impotent in trying to beef up its anti-corruption institutions, the only real surprise about the shocking revelations about corruption in Greece, was that it was not ‘discovered’ earlier.

To my mind ever present graft is a more lethal component of the same toxic cocktail that also includes cheap credit and high deficits.

Equally worrying is the fact that corruption in Greece not only touched upon the management of national funds but also lacked transparency in a big way as far as European subsidies were concerned.

When governments fail to fight corruption not only do they imply that they might indeed be corrupt, but even worse, that they end up sending an alarming signal that fuels even more tolerance of corruption within Greek society itself.

I do not believe that one should wait for a country to be pushed literally to bankruptcy for it to pull its socks up and decide to fight corruption head on.

When one recalls stories and allegations that one hears about our own car licensing division as well as MEPA-related permitting issues, one shudders at what Transparency International had to say when they not only claimed that the Greeks paid an average of €1355 in bribes last year per capita for public services but also for speeding up the issue of driver’s licences and construction permits. Déjà vu you might ask? I sincerely hope not.

While I am in no way implying that the Tax Compliance Unit do so or that the VAT Department did or are doing so too, it is worth being vigilant to ensure that we will not experience what the Greeks apparently went through when the BBC reported that many businesses regard the tax inspectors as all powerful protection racketeers who threaten companies with audits and heavy fines unless they pay bribes.

Meanwhile we look forward to find out as of now – rather than on election eve – what Lawrence Gonzi’s-anti corruption plan consists of, as well as how he intends to fight systemic corruption and the ever increasing red tape in our country. Even more so we are interested in finding out whether the PM intends to get real on fighting what we rightly classify as ‘political corruption’.

It is pointless for our Prime Minister – who has strong Catholic Action credentials – to go on and on about values as if values were just part of a Hare Krishna mantra only to hold back from visibly showing that he is tackling corruption head on to strengthen the feeling of respect for the role of law in this country.

Any excesses of the past are no excuse for current goings on. We need to plan ahead if we really want to live in a more transparent and accountable society.

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