Maravi

Corruption fight comes under global spotlight

Corruption fight comes under global spotlight
By Mutale Kapekele
Wed 19 May 2010, 04:00 CAT

PROFESSOR Richard Calland has said global ‘eyes’ are on Zambia to see how it is dealing with corruption in the construction sector.

Zambia is one of the pilot countries for the World Bank and DFID funded Construction Sector Transparency Initiative (CoST) project which is aimed at improving transparency in the construction sector.

Delivering a presentation on multi-stakeholders governance at the CoST lessons sharing workshop for Zambia, Malawi and the London Chapters, Prof Calland who is CoST consultant said if the pilots were successful, corruption would be easily fought throughout the world.

“There is a lot of global watch and they are examining what you are doing,” Prof Calland said. “If at the end of October (The deadline for the project) the project is successful, this will be the next big thing in democracy and the corruption fight.”

He said corruption in the construction sector was a big problem that could not easily be solved and that it would take more than the traditional governance systems to effectively fight the vice.

“Failure to fight corruption is due to systematic failure and this is not unique to developing countries, it applies to the developed world also,” he said. “If at the end of the pilot, you prove to be beyond traditional governance systems (executive, legislation and the judiciary), you will improve on transparency and lead the fight to combat corruption in the construction sector. CoST is a global experiment and it’s up to you to make it a success.”

And in an interview, National Construction Council executive director Sylvester Mashamba said the Council had contracted a consultant to find out if corruption was responsible for the high construction costs in the country.

He said the council had observed that Zambia’s construction costs were more expensive than those in the neighbouring countries.

Dr Mashamba said the consultant would report back his findings by October this year.
Although CoST is run by the Ministry of Works and Supply, it also has representation from the civil society and the church.

Labels: CONSTRUCTION SECTOR TRANSPARANCY INITIATIVE, CORRUPTION, RICHARD CALLAND

posted by MrK @ 4:47 AM