Local newspapers recently published a report by Transparency International in which Kuwait was ranked 67th globally in its Corruption Perceptions Index 2014.
The year before, Kuwait was ranked 64th, and it occupied a low rank among Gulf countries, as it was seventh among Arab countries and the eighth in the Middle East.
This prompts us to ask the people and the government: Why is there so much corruption in our country although it was the first country in the Gulf to have an elected national council which is effective in investigating the performance of the executive authority?
Our country enjoys media freedom that other Arabs envy, we have regulatory authorities looking into public funds, such as an audit bureau and an anti-corruption body, and we also have an independent, impartial judiciary.
Our society is an open-minded, educated community that freely discusses issues in gatherings and on intellectual forums. Finally, we have diverse groups like the Islamic and liberal parties. So, why does our country occupy the last rank in the Gulf?
Comparing Kuwait with the other Gulf countries is not fair. We have regulatory bodies that have the authority to request any information concerning public funds. The other Gulf countries do not have such bodies, and I do not think their governments easily give information in this regard.
While there is widespread corruption all over the world, including in Kuwait and the other Gulf countries, what concerns me is the reason behind corruption in our country. Who is responsible for it? And how can we fight it to improve our image abroad?
There are some indicators of corruption that we can mention here:
1. The disuse of laws that prevent the spread of corruption in municipalities. For example, there are six-storey residential complexes built along small roads. Who gave licences for these buildings? Were they penalised for that?
Regarding education, how come high school students get high scores but cannot write proper Arabic. Seventy percent of the students who applied for the engineering college failed in preparatory exams in Arabic and English languages and mathematics, despite the fact that they had A grades in high school.
This means that those students must have cheated or paid money to get their grades. They may have benefited from nepotism or favouritism based on tribal, sectarian or family ties.
2. The bureaucracy also plays a major role. Bureaucrats constantly postpone their decisions and actions, so citizens and residents bribe them to speed up their work. A businessman told me once that the government had to pay him a large sum of money but it didn’t do so on time, so he, like others, was forced to bribe officials to get his dues from the state.
3. The state representatives’ corruption, in the sense that citizens go to them to finalise their work, which is delayed due to mismanagement by the bureaucracy. The clever representative manages to get all paperwork done in a short span of time. This is how he benefits from the electors, while the government benefits as he votes for any laws it wants to implement. These representatives play a major role in spreading corruption as they accept bribes.
4. Ministers also play a role in spreading corruption by favouring their relatives, neighbours or members of their tribes and sects and employing them in government jobs. They get high official positions without having any administrative or educational skills. Their qualification is their link with a certain sheikh who represents one of the elites.
How can we fight corruption if our people, their representatives and ministers are involved in it? The worst thing is that the organisations that are meant to fight corruption are themselves corrupt and not impartial.
The Transparency Organization is dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood, so it publishes positive reports about organisations run by the Muslim Brotherhood’s members, like the Ministry of Religious Endowments.
The Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Interior, Sheikh Muhammad Al Khalid, uncovered corruption at the Religious Endowments Ministry. The minister revealed what was hidden in organisations that claim to be religious. But, to be fair, we must say that it is not only the Muslim Brotherhood that favours its members, as Salafis, nationalists and liberals also do the same and contribute to corruption.
It is said that whoever does not fear punishment acts recklessly. It is time to activate laws and stop nepotism. It is time to put the state’s administration in private hands in the hope of eliminating corruption.
The author is a researcher and political analyst
