Transparency
Complicated laws full of loopholes, rampant bureaucracy and a slow and inefficient legal system are all contributing towards a situation of chronic corruption in Portugal. The reasons behind Portugal’s ranking out of the 183 countries surveyed was largely due to Lisbon’s inability to resolve litigious proceedings involving politicians and failure to improve the country’s justice system.
On a European level, Portugal rose to 18th, and remains ahead of Malta, Italy, Greece, and former Eastern Bloc nations. The index scores 183 countries and territories from 0 (highly corrupt) to 10 (very clean) based on perceived levels of public sector corruption. It uses data from 17 surveys that look at factors such as enforcement of anti-corruption laws, access to information and conflicts of interest. Portugal was awarded an overall mark of 6.1 out of ten, which is up a decimal point from its rating 12 months before.
Hermetic laws, a justice system that doesn’t work and poor results in the fight against corruption are all reasons why, according to TI, Portugal is so high up in the ranking. Laws could be complicated, contradictory and full of rules that no one understood, while they gave an unlimited and arbitrary power to those in Government and administration. In the global ranking, Spain was less corrupt than Portugal while Turkey, Greece and Italy were more corrupt.
A Portuguese contact group for Transparency International, Transparência e Integridade, Associação Cívica (TIAC), was launched in Lisbon in September 2011. TIAC’s mission is to contribute towards to the strengthening of civil society and improving the quality of public and private sector governance in Portugal by promoting transparency, integrity and accountability. Some of its main priorities will be raising awareness of the damaging impact of corruption and empowering and encouraging citizens to participate in the fight against it. The launch of TIAC is timely following a number of high profile corruption cases in Portugal over the past few years in areas including defence contracts, suspected planning permission irregularities involving retail parks, sport bribery scandals and central and local government scams.
On a European level, Portugal rose to 18th, and remains ahead of Malta, Italy, Greece, and former Eastern Bloc nations. The index scores 183 countries and territories from 0 (highly corrupt) to 10 (very clean) based on perceived levels of public sector corruption. It uses data from 17 surveys that look at factors such as enforcement of anti-corruption laws, access to information and conflicts of interest. Portugal was awarded an overall mark of 6.1 out of ten, which is up a decimal point from its rating 12 months before.
Hermetic laws, a justice system that doesn’t work and poor results in the fight against corruption are all reasons why, according to TI, Portugal is so high up in the ranking. Laws could be complicated, contradictory and full of rules that no one understood, while they gave an unlimited and arbitrary power to those in Government and administration. In the global ranking, Spain was less corrupt than Portugal while Turkey, Greece and Italy were more corrupt.
A Portuguese contact group for Transparency International, Transparência e Integridade, Associação Cívica (TIAC), was launched in Lisbon in September 2011. TIAC’s mission is to contribute towards to the strengthening of civil society and improving the quality of public and private sector governance in Portugal by promoting transparency, integrity and accountability. Some of its main priorities will be raising awareness of the damaging impact of corruption and empowering and encouraging citizens to participate in the fight against it. The launch of TIAC is timely following a number of high profile corruption cases in Portugal over the past few years in areas including defence contracts, suspected planning permission irregularities involving retail parks, sport bribery scandals and central and local government scams.