Rising poverty could lead to more corruption
Updated
As the global financial crisis deepens there are claims the fallout will lead to greater scrutiny of major organisations.
However one official from the government agency responsible for managing Australia's assistance to developing nations says increasing poverty could lead to greater corruption. A claim backed by an organisation which keeps an eye on such activities.
Presenter: Michael Cavanagh
Speakers: Corbus de Swart, Transparency International; John Davidson, AusAID
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CAVANAGH: Transparency International works to promote such things as more open elections and diminish tolerance toward corruption and apathy. It is in nearly one hundred countries now since its founding in 1993. As part of the fight, it has teamed up with the Australian government through its development agency -- AusAid. The Parliamentary Secretary for International development Assistance Bob McMullen says this will provide the framework to strengthen the fight against corruption in the Asia-Pacific region.
This financial year Australia is spending more than 11 and a half million US dollars on anti-corruption measures in the Asia Pacific region.
Transparency International's Corbus de Swart says there is greater support at the community level in fighting corruption -- although he says the next five years will be an important period in challenging institutionalised corruption...
DE SWART: I think that if you look historically 15 years ago if anyone had said that is where we want to go most people around the world would have said it's impossible that this was too much ingrained in the way that governments operated, international organisations actively turned a blind eye. We have a different environment now - corruption is now accepted as one of the key social challenges of our time and we have much greater political will, we have seen over recent years ordinary citizens in regions across the world taking action on corruption, the challenge is over the next couple of years, the next five years or so, to make a significant impact and for ordinary citizens to no longer say parliaments, political parties, are corrupt institutions to have trust in political leadership that is ultimately where we want to go.
CAVANAGH: His observation that the next few years will be critical in the fight for greater transparency is echoed by AusAID's John Davidson. It' s predicted that the global financial meltdown will force many people back into poverty.
Mr Davidson says this means there needs to be even greater vigilance.
DAVIDSON: When you've got 90 million people tipping back into poverty because of the global recession when we know that while we are making inroads in the fight against corruption, there is an enormous amount of corruption out there.
CAVANAGH: While there may be a lot of corruption Mr De Swart says his organisation looks at the wider picture.
DE SWART: We are not essentially a name and shame organisation and our advocacy style as I said is based on critical but constructive engagement with all stakeholders pure and simply because if we were to take a different approach we might make a good splash for a few days but we would most certainly not survive in-country or globally. We have to accept, and this is sometimes difficult because we are idealists and we want to change the world, we have to accept that governments, companies NGO's have their problems, corruption is not going to be away tomorrow morning.
