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Corruption is an impediment to development – British High Commissioner
By Nicholas Peters
British High Commissioner to Guyana, Andrew Ayre, asserted the importance of lowering perceptions of
British High Commissioner Andrew Ayre
corruption if countries with a high corruption index are to develop. “It’s very important that recipients of development assistance clean up their act to the maximum extent as possible,” said the Commissioner in an interview with this publication.
His comments came on the heels of Transparency International’s 2014 Corruption Perception Index, where Guyana was ranked in the “highly corrupt” category.
The index shows Guyana lagging far behind its Caricom peers, placing 124th out of a 175 countries. Meanwhile countries like Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago rank much higher. The only Caricom country ranking lower is Haiti at 161.
According to the index, this would make Guyana the most corrupt English-speaking country in the region.
The countries were evaluated on a scale of 0 (highly corrupt) to 100 (very clean), with Guyana receiving a score of 30. Last year the country received a score of 28 to reflect marginal improvement.
A key observation that Ayre highlighted was the more corrupt a country, the less is the development within that country.
Commissioner Ayre explained that such a ranking can negatively affect foreign investor interest in a country like Guyana. He said that the cost of doing business is always higher in a country where the perception of corruption is higher, the reason for this being that there is a “risk premium” attached to the nation.
The diplomat said that lenders would look at figures such as the Corruption Perception Index, when determining whether it is worth investing in a low ranking country like Guyana.
However, there has still been investment from nations like the United Kingdom to developing countries where the perception of corruption is high.
The British High Commissioner defended this position as the UK’s strict belief that “development assistance” should be provided to developing countries throughout the world.
The UK official detailed that his country has succeeded in contributing upwards of 0.7 percent of Britain’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in development assistance.
Despite this position, countries like the UK have received criticism for investing in highly corrupt countries where the value of their investment is likely to decrease.
High Commissioner Ayre explained that the 2008 financial crisis has resulted in apprehension among UK citizens to give financial aid to corrupt countries. The people feel that they are not getting what they paid for.
“Our citizens do not want to see a scenario where one pound of development assistance becomes 10 pence,” said the UK representative. “They want to see one pound of development assistance equalling one pound of development.”
Therefore, it is very important for countries that want to receive development assistance to “clean up their act” so as to ensure that huge financial investments are solely spent on developing the country’s resources.
The High Commissioner explained that international public support is vital towards obtaining funding for developing countries.
“To have the public support for such a policy requires that the development assistance is spent on development and not on corruptive ways.”
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