New strategies needed to fight graft – experts

There is need for new strategies to stamp out pockets of corruption in public institutions. Officials made the remarks, yesterday, at the launch of Transparency International Rwanda’s 2016 Bribery Index at Kigali Convention Centre. The launch coincided with events to mark the International Anti-Corruption Day. The Bribery Index shows that corruption rate went up from 17.5 per cent last year to 24.4 per cent, an increase of 6.9 per cent. “More efforts should be put in modern ways of information gathering as the number of people who reveal information related to corruption is going down while corruption cases increase,” Chief Ombudsman Aloysie Cyanzayire said. Odette Uwamariya, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Local Government (L), speaks to Ombudsman Aloysie Cyanzayire during the meeting. / Timothy Kisambira Traffic Police leads in asking for bribes, up from 5.3 per cent last year to 15.5 per cent this year, according to the report. Local governments came second in asking for bribes, increasing from 4.8 per cent last year to 5.4 per cent. The third institution was the judiciary where corruption was recorded at 5.1 per cent compared to 2.1 per cent last year. In the utilities, corruption increased from 2.5 per cent last year to 4.2 per cent, according to the bribery index. Participants follow proceedings during the meeting. / Timothy Kisambira “Corruption is a threat to sustainable development of a nation, it undermines infrastructure development as part of the money earmarked for construction is paid as bribe,” said Cyanzayire. She stressed the need to fight corruption in service delivery, saying it holds back development. “If infrastructure does not last long, citizens are the most affected, Rwandans cannot live a better life without roads, water and other infrastructure,” she said. Public nonchalant Appolinaire Mupinganyi, the executive director of Transparency International Rwanda, decried the fact that while bribes incidents increase, Rwandans are not coming forward to report cases. Apollinaire Mupiganyi, the Executive Secretary of Transparency Rwanda, presents the findings during the meeting in Kigali. Timothy Kisambira “While bribery cases increase, Rwandans are less and less confident to report cases with only 15.4 per cent of people who encountered corruption having reported this year which decreased from 18.1 per cent,” Mupinganyi noted. He said the reasons why corruption is not reported vary but attributed it largely to fear of intimidation. “There is no way we can fight corruption without information, it is impossible and therefore there is need to rethink new strategies to avert the trend,” he added. If you look at the sample size of 2373 people, an estimation of Rwf35.5 billion was paid in corruption, according to Mupinganyi. He said that money can educate more than 605,000 students for a whole year under 12-Year Basic Education programme. A total of Rwf13.7 billion was paid as bribes in local governments, which is almost the total expenditure of the City of Kigali for the Financial Year 2014/15. It can also support 147,000 families providing them over Rwf20,000 per month, Mupinganyi said. Inspector General of Police Emmanuel Gasana acknowledged that corruption in both public and private sector is still high and called for combined efforts to fight the vice. Cyanzayire (L) chats with IGP Gasana during the meeting. / Timothy Kisambira He said there is also need for technology innovation to fight corruption as people profit from the new technology to offer bribe through electronic devices such as mobile money. Inspector General of Police Emmanuel K. Gasana speaks during the meeting in Kigali. / Timothy Kisambira If you look at people involved in corruption per year and police officers who are fired in a certain period, you realise that we need to combine efforts to fight the vice as well as enforcing new technologies to deal with e-corruption, he said. editorial@newtimes.co.rw

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New strategies needed to fight graft – experts