Mozambique: No effect from changes to anti-corruption laws; more needed – NGO

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Mozambique: No effect from changes to anti-corruption laws; more needed – NGO

2:03 CAT | 23 Mar 2021

File photo: DW

Mozambique’s Centre for Public Integrity (CIP), a non-governmental organisation, said on Tuesday that there had been improvements in the country’s anti-corruption laws since 2004, but that these are not producing effects, calling for further reforms.

In a statement, the NGO analysed the most recent amendment to the country’s penal code, made three months ago, and reviews the application of legislation over the past 17 years, since the creation of the Central Office for the Fight against Corruption.

“It is recognised that significant improvements have been introduced in the legal and institutional anti-corruption framework over the past years,” it said. “Nevertheless, the amendments have so far failed to reduce the levels of corruption in public administration.

“The problem of the ineffectiveness of the approved measures is more of a structural nature,” the CIP statement continues, suggesting the introduction of “more effective internal control measures, the strengthening of sanctioning measures at the level of public bodies and institutions, and investing in the prevention of corruption.”

The new penal code “presents substantial changes, especially with regard to the criminalisation of the various forms and types of corruption and related acts, which, if implemented effectively, will represent a qualitative leap in the control and fight against this phenomenon,” CIP states, while noting that “the perception of citizens about the effectiveness of the fight against corruption in Mozambique has been deteriorating.”

It cites the Corruption Perception Index of Transparency International (TI) for the year 2020, which shows Mozambique once again declining in that assessment.

Source: Lusa