Scorpions’ head moves to the World Bank

It’s a much less sexy job title for Leonard McCarthy.

The head of South Africa’s FBI-type crime-fighting agency known as the Scorpions was appointed on May 5 to head the World Bank’s anti-corruption unit – the less-creatively titled Department of Institutional Integrity. He’ll take over the job on June 30, reported Reuters:

McCarthy's appointment comes a day after Mbeki's government approved disbanding the FBI-styled Scorpions, bowing to pressure from supporters of rival Jacob Zuma who accused it of political abuse.
The governing African National Congress, led by Zuma, voted to get rid of the unit, officially known as the Directorate of Special Operations, last year.

The Scorpions, which was independent of the police and reports to the National Prosecuting Authority, was established to fight high-profile corruption cases and scored successes against organized crime in a number of cases.

The Scorpions won’t be disbanded entirely, notes the Economist; rather they will be incorporated into the regular police – which rankles many in South Africa.

TNS Research Surveys, a pollster, says that 59% of metropolitan South Africans think the Scorpions should stay separate from the police. A businessman has gone to court to stop the merger.

But the Scorpions may already be retracting their stings. Many of their people are loth to join the police and are busy looking elsewhere for jobs. The World Bank has just announced that it has recruited Leonard McCarthy, the Scorpions' boss, to lead its corruption-busting unit. That is a pity. South Africa badly needs its own anti-corruption force.

Putin’s heir promises to go after corruption

Dimitri Medvedev was sworn in as Russia’s third president on May 7, promising, among other things, to fight corruption, reported most papers, including the Moscow Times.

“We must achieve true respect for the law and overcome legal nihilism, which seriously interferes with development today,” he said, singling out the problem as one that needed “special attention.”

A lawyer by training, Medvedev first used the term “legal nihilism” in a January speech that marked the beginning of his election campaign. Boosting the rule of law was also a favorite Kremlin theme during the early years of the Putin presidency, when Putin called for a “dictatorship of the law.”

Fine words from the new leader of a country that Transparency International ranked as among the most corrupt countries of 180 studied – with a ranking of 143 – in its annual corruption perception index last year. Bloomberg also reported that in November 2006, Deputy Prosecutor-General Alexander Buksman estimated that Russian officials rake in some $240 billion in bribes every year.

US considering funding Merida initiative

The US Congress is considering giving $500 million in military and police equipment and training to the 14-month-old Merida initiative, which is supposed to be fighting transnational organized crime south of the US border.

“The United States has a compelling strategic interest in moving quickly to reinforce our partnership with Central America to check illicit activity in the region,” assistant Secretary of State Thomas Shannon told a congressional panel on May 8, as reported by the US Department of State.
Announced by President Bush and Mexican President Felipe Calder�n in October 2007, Merida grew out of President Bush's March 2007 visit to Latin America, where regional security figured prominently in his conversations with leaders in Guatemala and Mexico.

Drug trafficking and criminal organizations in Central America have grown in size and strength over the last decade, fueled by a northward flow of illegal drugs and human trafficking and a southward flow of unregistered weapons, Shannon said. Increasingly powerful, many of these criminal organizations outgun police and intimidate judges, while drug money further corrupts institutions and reduces public trust in the authorities, he said.

Congress heard this testimony the same day that Mexico’s national police chief was assassinated by gunmen who shot him at least nine times. Edgar Millan Gomez was the face of Mexico’s 17-month crackdown on drug cartels; he was the highest-ranking police official to be killed during that time. In the week before his murder, three other federal police officials were also killed in the Mexican capital, which was once largely immune to the drug and crime violence that has affected much of the country in the past two-and-a-half years. Major US newspapers and other media have covered the phenomenon; read some of the examples here, or here, or here or here.

So we can all agree that what’s happening in Mexico and other gang-encrusted countries in Central America is bad and that it’s in the interest of nearby countries that are affected to pitch in. But America is a funny country. Reactions on the Net to the little-known Merida initiative have been equally rabid from both the right (“We can’t finish our own border fence…yet the Bush administration wants to fork over $1.4 billion to Mexico and Central America – with much of it going into the hands of corrupt law enforcement officials…who have worked tirelessly to undermine our immigration laws.”) and the left (“Bush wants to send more lethal aid to the Peruvian and Mexican security forces involved in murdering anti-globalization activists”). Read the links. I am not making this up.

Bulgaria’s black eye continues

Though Bulgaria’s interior minister resigned last month in the midst of a corruption scandal that had exposed links between the country’s police and suspected organized crime figures, the country’s reputation is still in tatters, reports Reuters.

Some investors say the situation in the Balkan country has become worse than in neighboring Romania, ranked the most corrupt EU nation by Transparency International. Investing in Bulgaria without paying bribes or encountering the mafia is almost impossible, they say.

Economists say corruption is damaging Bulgaria's investment image and competitiveness. "It hasn't prevented investment but clearly it is a concern," said Jon Levy, an analyst at Eurasia Group. "It probably makes Bulgaria less competitive in comparison even to some other destinations in eastern Europe," he said.

The article goes on to say that Bulgaria has attracted some $9 billion in foreign investment every year for the past two years, but last year nearly half of it went to the construction and real estate sectors – both of which are known in the region for attracting organized criminals and money launderers.

Diplomats and analysts say the root of the problem lies in links between politicians and magistrates and criminal groups, some of which sprang from the former Soviet secret services. That makes graft a more challenging issue in Bulgaria, even though it ranks below Romania in Transparency International's 2007 survey of 180 countries.

"Organized crime and corruption have intertwined with the state here," said one diplomat. "In Romania they seem to be separate issues which makes it a bit easier to tackle."

Mongolians accept corruption

Mongolians increasingly see corruption as the only way to solve problems, and people in this generally little-known country are also not shying away from participating in corruption, reports Mongolia’s English-language daily, the UB Post. (I’m assuming this means bribing officials to get things done, but the article doesn’t say.)

The findings came out in the third annual corruption perception survey from the non-profit Asia Foundation. The survey also revealed that while Mongolians have confidence in their country’s new anti-corruption agency, most people only expect the agency to go after lower- and mid-level officials, rather than anyone particularly high ranking.

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