South Africa is increasingly becoming a society in which the politically connected make easy money without having to work for it, writes William Gumede – and this tendency undermines the country’s productive capacity and harms innovation and new investment. It discourages job creation and efforts to reduce poverty and inequality. It ultimately stymies economic growth.
Our zero for this week is Matlosana Local Municipality, for paying a security company R25-million of taxpayers’ money over a 22-year period – a company that armed its security officers with toy guns.
Dear Corruption Watch, as an employee, I want to blow the whistle on something going on, but my employment contract refers to confidentiality of information obtained during the scope of my work. Does the whistle-blowers act trump such legislation or company policy making disclosure of information criminal?
Effective civil society mobilisation won’t work with constant invocations of an idealised past and the memory of leaders long gone, writes David Lewis – nowadays it requires engagement with contemporary culture, contemporary icons, and contemporary concerns.
The connection between corruption and the failure to deliver basic services was glaring, said CW hoard member Zwelinzima Vavi on Thursday. The electricity, education and health sectors were suffering because of corruption.
Some of the corruption stories that made headlines around the world this week.
The newly launched central supplier database will be the source of all supplier information for all organs of state, and will reduce duplication of effort and cost for both business and government. At the same time it will facilitate electronic procurement processes.
Delegates at the 16th IACC have adopted the Putrajaya Declaration, which calls for grand corruption to be made an international crime, and also insists on full independence and autonomy for all anti-corruption bodies, among others.
Dear Corruption Watch, I am concerned that many high-profile and important positions in South Africa made by the president are compromised from the start, like the national prosecutions head. What alternatives to presidential appointment are there in South Africa and other countries?