After a meeting with President Vaira Vike-Frieberga on July 25, Prime Minister Andris Berzins told reporters he hoped foreign experts would be brought in to oversee the bureau's establishment.
"We have had several offers of help and funding from outside," said Atis Sjanitis, Berzins' foreign policy adviser. "There is a lot of interest from the members of NATO and the European Union."
But with arguments continuing over the bureau's role, potential donors have proved reluctant to commit funds, said Rudolfs Kalnins, chief officer at the Ministry of Justice's anti-corruption policy-making body, the corruption prevention council.
The Justice Ministry envisages the bureau taking over the anti-corruption work of several existing bodies currently overseen by the Interior Ministry, said Kalnins. The ministry wants it to combat the bribery of private citizens as well as public servants and have offices across the country.
Sjanitis said the establishment of some kind of anti-corruption bureau would receive wide support when it comes before the Cabinet in late August or early September. But it continues to be resisted by the national police, which is responsible to the Interior Ministry and is reluctant to lose officers to the new institution, according to its spokesman Krists Leiskalns.
"We are very happy to see this kind of project going on," he said. "But the money should be put into existing structures, which are already combating corruption on a day-to-day basis."
Inese Voika, director of the Latvian chapter of the corruption watchdog Transparency International, said the bureau would be a step forward even if it only targeted corruption in the state sector, as is the case with an equivalent institution in neighboring Lithuania.
"This idea has been a long time coming. We have to start somewhere. What is needed is a small, but strong unit. At least then there will be one body which is responsible. The corruption prevention council (headed by Kalnins) has a very weak mandate and low status at the Justice Ministry.
"It is a great idea to bring in an outsider, as it has happened in Hong Kong and Chicago. But they tend to be very vulnerable. They would meet a lot of resistance. It would have to be a partnership between a local leader and the outsider."
In June Latvia was again placed in the bottom half of a Transparency International survey of corruption levels around the world. Its score was 3.4 out of 10, as it has been for the last three years, but it slipped from 57th position in the list of 91 countries to 59th. A score of 10 would indicate zero corruption.
Estonia slipped from 26th position to 28th, with a score of 5.6, while Lithuania improved its position, being placed 38th, with a score of 4.8. Scores are determined by consulting expert bodies such as, in Latvia's case, the European Intelligence Unit, as well as members of the business community.
Voika said Latvia's low score results in part from subjective factors, such as unsubstantiated media gossip about corruption and negative attitudes towards the Latvian state. "In Estonia the capture of the state by business interests is less visible because the economy is more diverse. But Latvia's score does raise questions. It shows that business people think corruption is a serious problem."
Next year Transparency International will release a survey whose focus will be bribe paying, rather than bribe taking. Some may be surprised by its findings, said Voika. "Until April 1999 businesses in Sweden and Germany, which are perceived as uncorrupted countries, were allowed to avoid paying tax on bribes paid when doing business abroad. Sweden's bribe paying culture should be highlighted."
Please enter your username and password.
2024 © The Baltic Times /Cookies Policy
