South Africa is among eight corruption hotspots named in a recent survey undertaken by maritime legal specialists, ENSafrica. It joins Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, Kenya, Mozambique, Nigeria and Uganda. And, according to ENSafrica, having an effective anti-corruption programme is more important for companies today than ever before. “Many companies are now recognising the potential reputational harm, economic costs, fines, penalties and potential criminal prosecution that bribery and corruption pose to their business.” Mike Fitzmaurice, CEO of the Federation of Eastern and Southern African Transport Associations (Fesarta), told FTW that after his study of the survey he could find nothing wrong with it. “From a Fesarta standpoint,” he said, “I would strongly agree with the last paragraph – that the only way to stamp out or minimise bribery and corruption is to introduce an anti-bribery compliance programme. “Not only in the private sector, but more importantly at a government level. But whether or not this will ever happen remains to be seen.” Fitzmaurice likened compliance programmes to self-regulation – which forces you to conform to a set of standards that can be monitored. Thus gauging your performance and efficiency. “Unfortunately,” he added, “this does not happen often enough in Africa – and that's why we are seen as a corruption hotspot. “This is why our border posts are corruption hotspots as there is no compliance or efficiency. Just chaos – and chaos breeds corruption and bribery.” According to the survey, in which 88 organisations across Africa (including Mauritius) participated, incidents of bribery have increased, but so has general awareness of anti-bribery compliance among organisations. 24% of organisations experienced an incident of bribery and/ or corruption in the past 24 months (an increase of 4% since 2013), with 5% reporting five or more incidents in that period. Among the interesting findings, 68% of those surveyed believe that third party business partners pose the greatest source of bribery risk to their organisations. Meanwhile, 17% of organisations feel they are highly exposed to bribery in Africa (a drop of 33% compared to 2013), while 71% believe they are moderately exposed to bribery and corruption in Africa. The survey also found that 62% of organisations now conducted due diligence screening on third parties, an increase of 22% from 2013, with 38% conducting no anti bribery due diligence of third party business partners.
