Using Experts to Fight Corruption

The Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) was set up in the United Kingdom in 2006 as a national law enforcement agency.  It has a terrific logo and website and acts as a repository for expertise on combating serious crime in the UK.

So it’s a privilege to have two top counter-corruption experts from SOCA in Kyiv to address their Ukrainian counterparts at a “Building Integrity Experts Meeting” at the NATO Liaison Office in Kyiv.  The two set out practical advice on how to fight corruption in public office, including within law enforcement agencies themselves.  The briefing is based around experience of fighting corruption within law enforcement agencies in the UK, and best practice in fighting corruption in public office.  The SOCA experts are open and honest about corruption challenges in the UK and offer to work in partnership with their Ukrainian colleagues.  The latter, in turn, describe work so far in their organisations, including numbers of arrests and convictions.

The UK has done a lot of work with Ukrainian partners to fight corruption in Ukraine – see, for example, my previous blogs Building Integrity in Ukraine and How to Make Ukraine Stable, Secure and Prosperous.  But progress remains slow: we continue to receive widespread reports of corruption in government agencies; and many residents of Kyiv and other cities tell me they take it for granted that when a policeman flags them down at the side of the road they will be asked for a bribe.  In short, Ukraine still does not yet feel like a country where the authorities are in a full-blooded struggle to bear down on corruption in every shape and form.

All this may change when the new anti-corruption law now under discussion is finalised.  The key will be how any new legislation is actually enforced.  While foreign partners such as the UK may do their bit to help, the primary responsibility must lie with the Ukrainian authorities to roll up their sleeves and get serious about fighting corruption.  Having just returned from a holiday driving thousands of miles around the picturesque country of Lesotho, where one can safely be flagged down by a policeman without having any concern that one will be asked for a bribe, I am confident that this is possible.  It will be good if, a year from now, I am hearing reports from businessmen and others in Kyiv that they have noticed a substantial decrease in the level of corruption – including the traffic police.