The World Bank at its annual meeting in Singapore is strengthening its antigraft strategy to address corruption at the project, country and global levels. Transparency International president Huguette Labelle talked to The Jakarta Post's Riyadi Suparno about the bank's anticorruption strategy.
Question: How do you view the World Bank's antigraft strategy and what are your expectations for the future?
Answer: We welcome it because it's a good strategy. If corruption is not dealt with, development will not occur, the poor will stay poor, and countries will remain fragile. You know they may have good economic growth today, but usually, what corruption does is that creates great disparities; some people get very rich, the rest stay poor, and the middle classes very often become poorer.
It leads to the eventual destabilization of the country. From humanitarian point of view, it's wrong, and from a sustainable development point of view, it is also very wrong.
We are looking forward to working together with the World Bank about the policy's implementation. And we are urging the World Bank to work closely with various people in the countries concerned to make sure that the media, civil society and the private sector is at the table with government. The parliamentarians must also find ways of getting rid of corruption and ensure that the development that takes place is transparent and graft-free.
In a more tangible way, how do you expect this strategy will work in the field?
The current strategy should influence the way that the staff work in the field so that they don't feel that the only people they should be talking to are the executives in government. They should involve other people.
Also we are suggesting that if there is a major problem in terms of corruption in a country, where the money is not going to the people, the World Bank should change the nature of how it supports that country. It's not a question of pulling out because the poor will suffer, but it's a question for a period of time to encourage, to support the country in fixing the problem and at the same time, ensuring that they work through other mechanisms to deliver essential programs like health, education, water.
In your corruption perception index, Indonesia is always at the bottom. What suggestions would you give to improve the ranking?
There is a long list of ways, but I will only name a few. One: you've got to make sure that the country has the right laws, the right institutions, and the right rules. But you don't stop there, because you may have all of them, but the laws may not be implemented or not enforced. Therefore, you have to find ways to encourage the country to make sure that it engages with their institutions, so that the policeman do not have to look the other way and ask for a bribe, the judge doesn't accept the bribe, and the judges don't enforce the law only for small cases, but not when the big guys in front of them. Judges must treat cases with total objectivity, and if people are guilty, they are guilty and go jail or pay or both. That's one aspect.
The other aspect is ensuring that the government has very transparent budget allocations, all the way down to the schools, to the hospitals, that the budget is easy to understand, and the people understand it in their language, and it's posted on the door, so that they know how much money is supposed to come, and therefore, they can ask questions.
There are many ways of empowering the people. But if the people don't have the information, or if they have wrong information, how can they hold the government accountable? I find that even poor people, even some illiterate people, if they are given what they need, they can stand up and hold the government accountable.
The third area is that the private sector in the country has to clean up its act as well. The international private sector also has to clean up its act so that it doesn't offer bribes to get contracts.
I also find that doing major independent structural reviews, sector by sector, in customs, health and education, and with the political will to clean up those sectors, will also help reduce corruption.
Some of those measures are already pursued and in some cases, implemented in Indonesia, and yet this country still ranks very low on your list. What does it take for countries like Indonesia to improve their standing in your corruption perception index?
The way that this index is done, it is anywhere between five and 14 different surveys by surveying companies of what we call the elites of that country and those working with the country. So, it will be the media, the academics, economists, private sector, the banks, and it's how they perceive corruption levels in the country, and that's why it's a perception index.
In order to avoid blips, this is done over three years. So, it takes a little bit of time. If a lot has been done in a country, it is not reflected in the index immediately. We are looking now -- because things are changing so fast -- at having one every two years, rather than three, and this may help countries like Indonesia.
But at the end, it is those who answer the survey who need to be convinced that this is for real. It's important for governments, like the one of Indonesia, to make sure that they communicate to the people what they are doing, and they keep telling them, and they do what they say. This is probably the best that I can do in helping you with that one.
Do you have any faith that Indonesia will succeed in its fight against corruption and become a prosperous nation?
Yes. I used some of the countries who are doing well economically but at high level of corruption to illustrate the fact that if the corruption is high, it is not sustainable, somewhere along the way, something is going to burst, and that is what happened in Indonesia.
But I think a lot of good things are happening in Indonesia right now, and I hope they are going to be sustained, continued. We hope that the people of Indonesia will support these things, and encourage the government to continue, because you can be sure that there are a lot of pressures on the government not to do some of these things.
