Afghanistan's Corruption Fight Needs a Better Strategy

Ajmal Shams

Politics, Asia

The country’s future is at stake.

The endemic problem of corruption in Afghanistan is by no means a new subject. Corruption has been widespread and widely debated in a war-ravaged country that remains in turmoil. According to Transparency International, Afghanistan has a score of 11 on the Corruption Perceptions Index (2015) on a scale from 0 (highly corrupt) to 100 (very clean). Corruption has continued to undermine the credibility of Afghanistan’s government for the last fourteen years. It remains a daunting challenge for the National Unity Government, which will complete its second year in office in September 2016.

“The government” in this article refers to the machinery of the state that has been in power for the past fourteen years. Realizing the seriousness of the threat, President Ashraf Ghani had to take an immediate step to at least control corruption related to the awarding of government contracts. Soon after taking office, he established a national procurement commission which he himself chairs. Almost every contract to be awarded by the government requires scrutiny from the commission and endorsement before it can proceed. Oversight over procurement at this level may not be sustainable in the long run. Yet it speaks to the hard truth that the president has no trust in the system, leaving him no option but to be personally involved in the overall process. It is a good short-term mechanism to ensure transparency, but no long-term panacea for controlling corruption. President Ashraf Ghani, who has a worldwide reputation for statesmanship, must surely be working on institutionalizing the procurement procedures. This means eventually phasing out the national procurement commission, allowing more time for the president to work on other issues of national importance and putting in place a system that works without requiring the president to intervene.