Word: corruption
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...second malady is corruption. Kenya ranks eighth from the bottom on the list of the world's most corrupt countries, compiled by the watchdog group Transparency International. Kibaki's government and that of his predecessor Daniel arap Moi have been dogged by allegations of dirty deals running into hundreds of millions of dollars. Kibaki's former anti-corruption czar John Githongo went into self-imposed exile in Britain in 2005 after he became disillusioned by the President's lack of commitment to fighting graft and faced death threats. The government, he tells TIME, had "abandoned promises to equitably share power...
...Kenya, so in Africa's other powers. Africa is the also the world's most corrupt continent, with 36 out of 52 countries afflicted by rampant graft. In Nigeria the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission says the country's rulers stole $400 billion from 1960 to 1999. In South Africa barely a week goes by without a new corruption scandal among the business and political élite. A week after he was elected leader of the ruling African National Congress, Jacob Zuma was indicted on one charge of racketeering, one of money laundering, two of corruption and 12 of fraud...
...Incumbents like Kibaki, Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe and Uganda's Yoweri Museveni are among those who tried to alter their country's constitutions--some successfully--to cling to power. African voters are to some extent complicit in the undermining of democracy. When given an opportunity to vote out one corrupt leader, they often elect another, hoping he will be more generous with his ill-gotten gains...
...fellow sub-Saharan Africans? For the West, part of the answer lies in holding African governments accountable for the graft and misrule that sow popular disgruntlement. The West largely contents itself with the appearance of democracy in Africa, not the reality, and gives billions of dollars in aid to corrupt governments. "The World Bank runs around establishing anti-corruption commissions," says Joel Barkan, a senior associate at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington who was in Kenya for the vote. "They have been singularly ineffective." In Kenya the IMF and the World Bank suspended...
...grew by 9.6%, the World Bank named Georgia the top reformer in the world. Its officials forecast growth of 14.5% in 2007. The Georgian government boosted revenues by tightening up the administration of the tax system. Private investment went up and there has been a crackdown on corruption. Per capita income is up from $700 a year in 2003 to the current figure of $1,500. The most astonishing achievement was Saakashvili's reform of the traditionally corrupt police forces. He disbanded the entire Ministry of the Interior - with recruitment based on the western testing system. It may come...