Corruption thrived in country this year: TI report

* Rs 223bn corruption in 2010
* Police, bureaucracy maintain ranking as two most corrupt public institutions
* Customs, income tax departments rated less corrupt

By Amar Guriro

KARACHI: The Transparency International Pakistan (TIP) launched the National Corruption Perception Survey 2010 at the Karachi Press Club on Tuesday.

According to the report, corruption worth Rs 223 billion occurred in the country this year compared to Rs 195 billion in 2009. The report said during 2010, police and bureaucracy maintained their ranking as the two most corrupt public sector institutions, while land administration institutions ranked third in corrupt practices.

Corruption in the judiciary, education and local government sectors increased as compared to 2009, however, customs and taxation departments ranked lower in the list this year.

TIP Chairman Syed Adil Gilani said, “In terms of bribery, land administration was the most corrupt sector, where average bribe paid in each incident was Rs 46, 414.” He said according to the survey, about 70 percent of Pakistanis thought that the present government was more corrupt than the previous one. Among the four provincial governments, Punjab government was the only one rated better than its predecessor, while the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government was rated the most corrupt of the four, Gilani said.

The report added that massive corruption was carried out while issuing tenders for development projects, with at least 40 percent of the budget of a tender ending up in misappropriations. Quoting an example, he said by implementing the Public Procurement Rules 2004, the Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) saved at least Rs 49.3 million in a tender for transportation of sugar, spending 40 percent less than last year.

“Corruption is the root cause of all problems in the country and owing to the lack of governance in Pakistan, the credibility of the country has fell internationally. This can be observed from the fact that the Friends of Pakistan Trust Fund, being managed by the World Bank, has not issued any funds to the country in the last two years,” Gilani said.

“The government of Pakistan needs to address corruption, as the judiciary did by announcing a judicial policy with a zero tolerance for corruption and the Pakistan Army did by removing its senior officers from civilian postings,” he said.

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