Guyana making no progress in fight against corruption

Jan 31, 2024 News

---

– Int’l body urges greater transparency in oil sector, emphasis on democratic governance

Kaieteur News – The fight against corruption has stagnated in Guyana in recent years after the country had dug itself out of the morass during the years of the previous government, Transparency International observed in its latest Corruption Perceptions Index.

When the PPP/C demitted office back in 2015, the country was scoring below 30 points, however during the years of the APNU+AFC that score steadily improved reaching 41. Three full years since the ruling PPP/C returned to government, the ranking has stagnated at 40 – ranking it at 87 out of 180 countries, the global coalition against corruption said.

In its latest report released on Tuesday transparency International said: “Guyana (40) has significantly risen in the CPI over the last 12 years, however recently the country has stagnated. The oil-rich nation must still place stronger emphasis on building a well-functioning democratic system and implement greater levels of transparency and oversight, especially in the extractive industry.”
According to Transparency International, corruption in this sector implies the loss of billions of dollars, which could be used to improve public services and development in one of the poorest countries in the hemisphere.

Meanwhile, Transparency International said the 2023 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) shows that corruption is thriving across the world. It noted that the CPI ranks 180 countries and territories around the globe by their perceived levels of public sector corruption, scoring on a scale of 0 (highly corrupt) to 100 (very clean).  Over two-thirds of countries score below 50 out of 100, which strongly indicates that they have serious corruption problems. The global average is stuck at only 43, while the vast majority of countries have made no progress or declined in the last decade. What is more, 23 countries fell to their lowest scores to date this year.

Injustice and trouble at the top

According to TI, the global trend of weakening justice systems is reducing accountability for public officials, which allows corruption to thrive. “Both authoritarian and democratic leaders are undermining justice. This is increasing impunity for corruption, and even encouraging it by eliminating consequences for criminals. Corrupt acts like bribery and abuse of power are also infiltrating many courts and other justice institutions across the globe. Where corruption is the norm, vulnerable people have restricted access to justice while the rich and powerful capture whole justice systems, at the expense of the common good.”

The body said too that countries ranking high on the CPI have an impunity problem of their own, even if this isn’t reflected in their scores. It noted that many cross-border corruption cases have involved companies from top-scoring countries that resort to bribery when doing business abroad. Others have implicated professionals who sell secrecy or otherwise enable foreign corrupt officials. And yet, top-scoring countries often fail to go after perpetrators of transnational corruption and their enablers.

Americas

With respect to the Americas, the report noted that weak and unaccountable public institutions in Latin America have created fertile ground for organised criminal networks to flourish, fuelling violence and insecurity. “These are among the main concerns for Latin Americans, along with corruption and the economy. In many countries, law enforcement and corrupt officials collaborate with criminal gangs or accept bribes in exchange for turning a blind eye to their illicit activities. In Honduras (23), Guatemala (24) and Peru (36), evidence suggests that organised criminals wield a strong influence over candidates and politicians, financing electoral campaigns or even running for public office themselves,” the report states.

According to Transparency International, the impacts of these intertwined criminal and political interests are felt particularly by the most marginalised groups in society, and witnessed in the destruction of natural resources. Across the region, women, girls and migrants are victims of human trafficking and sextortion, which usually involves public officials demanding sexual acts in exchange for services like awarding passports or granting passage through border controls. Corrupt networks also fuel wildlife trafficking, illegal logging, illicit gold mining, and slash-and-burn land clearance.

In the Amazon, the report states that the drug trade has brought violence to the ancestral territories of indigenous and Afro-descendent peoples, which coincide with critical areas of high biodiversity. Moreover, in 2021, Latin American countries recorded the highest number of killings of human rights defenders. Colombia (39) had the highest numbers of killings of human rights defenders with 138, followed by 42 in Mexico (31) and 27 in Brazil (38). Too often, murders of environmental and anti-corruption defenders go unpunished due to corrupt and criminal networks’ infiltration of local governments and the justice system.

Meanwhile, to tackle organised crime and gang violence some governments have taken extreme measures that concentrate power in the executive branch, reducing transparency and accountability, and posing serious threats to human rights and basic freedoms. For instance, the declaration of states of exception during 2022 in countries like El Salvador (33), Ecuador (36) and Honduras (23) – whilst constitutional and officially temporary – granted extraordinary powers to the executive branch to suspend constitutional guarantees. They impacted people’s rights to assembly, access to information, transit and basic procedures during an arrest. In the name of security, these governments closed down civic space, shrinking its oversight capabilities and considerably increasing democratic backsliding and risks of corruption.

---

• against, APNU+AFC, corruption, Corruption Perceptions Index, Guyana

---