Georgia Appeals to Public to Help Fight Corruption

The Georgian government acknowledged this winter that controlling corruption is one of its top priorities. George Papuashvili and Goka Gabashvili of the Open Society Georgia Foundation and Zaza Namoradze of the Constitutional and Legal Policy Institute report on efforts to strengthen the government's anticorruption initiative by getting the public and NGOs directly involved in anticorruption policymaking.

ilitary officials line their pockets with money budgeted for their soldiers' food. A student buys a diploma to avoid years of study. A criminal breaks the law, confident that a bribe to the right police officer or prosecutor will make any charges disappear.

In Georgia, corruption has permeated all levels of society—from doctors and lawyers to traffic cops and athletes. Indeed, the extent of corruption is so great that it is seen by international and domestic policymakers as the primary obstacle to Georgia's political and economic development.

Transparency International's 1999 Corruption Perceptions Index, which ranks countries in order from least to most corrupt, put Georgia at 84th out of the 99 countries analyzed. Neighboring Turkey, Armenia, Russia, and Azerbaijan ranked 54th, 80th, 82nd, and 96th, respectively.

President Eduard Shevardnadze recently wrote in the draft Guidelines for the National Anticorruption Program, "If we fail to cure the nation, public and State from the poisonous malady of corruption, Georgia, as a civilized nation, and Georgia, as an independent state, will have no future."

In the past, Shevardnadze's government has made half-hearted attempts to tackle corruption. Of late, however, the government appears to have adopted a more serious, systematic approach by creating a working group last summer, which then drafted the General Guidelines for the National Anticorruption Program in October 2000. In March, Shevardnadze signed a decree initiating anticorruption measures that lead up to the full program.

The guidelines acknowledge the presence of illegal lobbying groups in all three branches of government, "criminal overlapping interests" in the public and private sectors, and describe how corruption easily took hold in the weak state. Georgia is depicted as a pyramid of corruption. At the base, there is "petty" corruption with low-and mid-level officials extorting minor bribes and favors while at the top is "grand" corruption with state agencies and high-level officials embezzling huge sums of money and resources.

The government has responded by putting forward a set of measures to bring transparency to Georgia's institutions and to overcome the sense of impunity that fuels corruption. The measures stress economic liberalization and deregulation of state agencies to decrease the power of officials to extort citizens and squander public resources. Other measures call for the reform of law-enforcement and regulatory agencies to make them more open and accountable to the public.

While the European Union, the World Bank, and civil society advocates like George Soros have expressed interest in supporting the program, two significant questions remain: Does the Georgian public really care? And what will it take to win popular support?

"Corruption is a way of life," David Usupashvili, a principal architect of the guidelines, told reporters in January. "People were naturally cynical about communist laws and rules, but in independent Georgia they still don't respect any laws. People don't believe that the state will ever provide services or enforce the law, so they don't pay taxes."

In an effort to increase people's trust in public institutions and policies, the Open Society Georgia Foundation (OSGF), together with USAID contractor organizations and Georgian NGOs, started the Anticorruption Program Distribution Project in December 2000. The project aims to cultivate public support for anticorruption efforts by providing Georgians with the government's plan and allowing them to make recommendations to improve it.

Commercial vendors, schools, and universities have distributed 150,000 copies of the Anticorruption Program, a letter from the working group, and a questionnaire throughout the country. The mailing cost of returning questionnaires is covered by the project. The working group will then consider the responses later this year.

OSGF and OSI's Constitutional and Legal Policy Institute (COLPI) have contributed $18,000 to the project's $41,000 budget. The U. S. Department of Justice, USAID, and Transparency International-Georgia are covering the remaining costs.

OSGF is also planning follow-up meetings to its December NGO roundtable, which will focus on developing anticorruption projects for Georgian NGOs, and how the media and NGOs can assist and also monitor government anticorruption efforts.

Georgia is plagued by severe corruption, and many are skeptical about efforts to defeat it. However, it is crucial for Georgia to stamp out this disease and develop a transparent society—a prerequisite for democracy. Despite its weakness and instability, the government's avowed commitment to fighting corruption is a positive sign. Outreach efforts to include the public in this struggle will do much to increase optimism about limiting corruption and giving Georgia a secure future.

Zaza Namoradze is deputy director of the Constitutional and Legal Policy Institute (COLPI), Open Society Institute-Budapest; Goka Gabashvili is program coordinator at the Open Society Georgia Foundation; George Papuashvili is program director for Anticorruption and Law Programs at the Open Society Georgia Foundation.

FOR MORE INFORMATION
	For information from the government, visit www.corruption.ge For one of Georgia's best anticorruption NGOs, visit www.crc.iberiapac.ge For information about Soros foundation involvement, visit www.osgf.ge

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