TI rates military regime as more corrupt than political governments

NAB is political tool of regime rather than for ending corruption

Islamabad September 20, 2006: A PPP spokesperson has drawn attention to the report by Transparency International which has claimed that the present military regime is perceived as more corrupt than its democratic or civilian predecessors.

The corruption watchdog's 2006 report on Pakistan is based on a sample of 4,000 urban and semi-urban citizens in all four provinces. Asked about the present government, 33 percent of the respondents thought that it was corrupt in 1999-2002, but when asked to assess the period 2002-06, more than 67 percent thought it was corrupt. Yes, it is true 67% - this is the highest ever rating given to a government in Pakistan of corruption.

In a statement today spokesman of the Party said that despite rating as first in corruption according to Transparency International, the regime was not facing a single National Accountability Bureau case. This proved that the NAB was for political and not for corruption purposes.

He said that corruption must be eradicated. Transparency International report highlights the perception of corruption amongst the citizens. Instead of politicizing corruption, the task of the Parliament and the people should be to tackle corruption through setting high moral standards, freedom of information and an impartial anti corruption watch-dog. The PPP pledged to do this when voted into government.

The PPP spokesman said that Transparency International findings also rejected the military regime's view that military dictatorships are honest. It may be recalled that the military dictatorship supporters and the supporters of democracy often trade charges as to which government is more corrupt. The transparency international view, though not
complimentary about political governments, nonetheless comes out against the military regime as number one in corruption.

He said that when military regimes of Ayub, Yahya, Zia and Musharaf were most corrupt, creating from twenty two families to a high of sixty seven percent corruption, it meant that the lower scores showed that the political governments had improved on the situation although there is still a long way to go.

The spokesman said the issue of corruption should be separated from politics. The history of Pakistan shows that the corruption prevails because laws are mocked and political parties broken by abuse of the word while the actual corruption proliferates.