Ethiopia has "High Defense Corruption", TI's Defense Corruption report out

By De Birhan 
29 January 2013

Transparency International U.K.'s Government Defense Anti-corruption Index (GDAI) released today has listed Ethiopia in the "D - Band" Category of High Defense Corruption. The Report stated with regard to political corruption risk, Ethiopia, though there are de jure provisions for a standing committee to scrutinize policy, the ruling party has 99 per cent of seats, making significant objection to policy unlikely. "There is a concern over the role of ethnicity and political loyalty in military selection processes." reads the Report. Similarly in terms of procurement, the Report said “Open competition in procurement is not carried out in practice."

 

 

Each country was assessed using a comprehensive questionnaire of 77 questions, clustered into five risk areas:  political risk, finance risk, personnel risk, operations risk, and procurement risk and scores them in bands A to F, with A being "very low" and F "critical where Eritrea is placed. 

Only Australia and Germany were listed in the A band, which grouped defense establishments that are "accountable to their citizens, ... are transparent about their spending and activities, and have strong controls in place to combat corruption that are actively enforced," stated the Report. 

Fifty seven of the 82 countries assessed, or 70 percent, have high to critical risk of corruption, scoring in bands D, E, or F.

The global cost of corruption in the defense sector is estimated to be a minimum of US$20 billion each year, the organization said, citing data from the World Bank and the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

To read the full report click Here.