Vietnam’s President Vo Van Thuong resigned today after being caught up in a long-running corruption scandal. Vietnam has been in the middle of a wide-ranging Anti-Corruption drive for several years. According to the AP, Thoung was the second president in two years to resign from his post, which, for a country striving to be more democratic, is not a good look. This comes shortly after an ally of Thoung, the governor of the central Vietnamese province Quang Ngai, resigned from his post due to allegations of corruption. While this anti-corruption campaign shows no signs of stopping anytime soon, concerns about political stability will grow if more Vietnamese politicians get arrested.
Category: Civil Society
Corruption in the Comoros Islands: The Passport Scandal.
Disclaimer: I met a gentleman from Comoros in my local coffee shop on Friday who suggested I look into corruption there.)
Twelve years ago, Comoros Islands, a small chain of islands off the Southeastern coast of Africa, started a scheme to allow stateless persons from the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait to buy Comoros citizenship. According to a report in Reuters, there are immediate concerns about where and what the profits of the sold passport were going towards. There were also concerns about how the promised development projects the UAE and Kuwait pledged to would come to fruition. According to a report in November of 2022 by Al Jazeera, the president at the time, Ahmed Abdallah Sambi, was sentenced to life in prison for crimes of “high treason” after it was found that he embezzled $1.8 billion in government profits from the scheme. Sadly, like many other African leaders, Sambi wanted to enrich himself and his immediate circle with the proceeds of a scheme that seemed dodgy straight from the off.
Corruption Scandal Rocks Portuguese Election.
This Sunday, Portugal goes to the polls in a pivotal election. According to a report in The Washington Post, both parties in the governing coalition, the social democratic party and the socialist party, have been rocked by numerous corruption scandals. In particular, 75 thousand euros were found in brown envelopes in a bookcase in the Prime Minister’s office last year. There is a real chance that like in other parts of Europe in recent years, the far-right wing could be elected due to the ongoing corruption scandal. The AP reports that the Chega (Enough) party could play kingmakers in specific election scenarios. This scandal has a comedic element in that Ikea had a billboard showing a bookcase with the tagline “A good place to stash books Or 75,800 Euros.”
Albania Rocked by Corruption Protests.
Earlier this week, protests centered around the alleged corruption of the ruling Socialist Party have shaken the country’s political foundations. The protests also came on the 33rd anniversary of the toppling of the former dictator Enver Hoxha. According to a report by ABC opposition politicians, civil society is frustrated by the Albanian parliament not investigating allegations of corruption by Prime Minister Edi Rama and his cabinet. The protests also supported former prime minister and current opposition leader Sali Berisha, who is under house arrest facing corruption charges related to helping his son-in-law facilitate a real estate deal. I don’t see this situation resolved peacefully anytime soon, and I fear that a wave of political instability could affect Albania shortly.
Former Thai Leader Thaksin Released On Parole.
Yesterday, former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra was released on parole due to failing health. According to a report from the BBC, he was released from a police hospital where he had been serving a one-year prison sentence after being found guilty of corruption and abuse of power charges. Last August, he returned to Thailand after being in self-imposed exile for 15 years after a military coup ousted him. According to a report by Aljazeera, many in Thailand are unhappy that Thaksin’s sentence was reduced from eight years to one year and feel that Thaksin and the current Thai government brokered a sweetheart deal to shorten Thaksin’s sentence. No one is sure what will happen next, but knowing Thaksin, despite ill health, he will want to play a role in Thai politics.
Navalny pronounced dead by Putin’s Regime.
(A disclaimer for this article: I was at an event this morning held by the U.S Institute of Peace (USIP), an international relations think tank here in Washington DC, discussing the future of Russia post Putin).
The Russian prison authorities announced this morning that Alexi Navalny, the prominent critic of President Putin, was found dead in his cell. It has been reported that as of yesterday, Navalny was displaying his usual sense of humor, which is remarkable considering his situation. It has been well-known that Navalny was gravely ill and was being denied proper healthcare by the Russian government. According to a report by the Washington Post, fears for Navalny grew after he was arrested in January 2021 upon returning to Russia after recovering in Germany from an attempt on his life by the use of Novichok, a banned nerve agent. The response to Navalny’s death has been swift, according to a report by the New York Times. Navalny’s wife strode into the conference room where the Munich Security Conference (a well-known gathering of world leaders discussing international security issues) was held. She denounced Putin’s regime, openly reporting those in the audience spellbound. All of this raises the question: why does this matter?
The answer is that it matters a great deal. According to an article in the Post, Navalny was the main figurehead for anti-Putin opposition in Russia and worldwide, leading many protests within the country. However, more importantly, Navalny had a pioneering YouTube channel and organization that focused on the rampant corruption within Putin’s Russia. It is unclear what will happen next; at the event I attended today, several of the panelists stated that it is a fool’s errand to predict what might happen post-Putin and that it is likely that either Putin will have to die or that Ukraine will have to win the war decisively for Putin to be deposed. One can only hope that Navalny’s death, while tragic, can spur a new generation of Russian civil society to take on Putin and that the West will continue to fund Ukraine’s war effort.
TI Corruption Index Shows a Decline in Law and Justice Causes a Rise in Corruption.
On Tuesday, Transparency International (TI) released its annual Corruption Perception Index, which shows how corrupt a country is perceived to be. TI ranks country from 0 to 100; the closer a country is to 0, the more corrupt it is; for example, Somalia was ranked 11 out of 100, meaning that TI views them as the most corrupt country in the world. On the other hand, Denmark was ranked 90 out of 100, meaning they were the least corrupt. According to TI’s website, the biggest threat to stopping corruption is the weakening of law & order worldwide, as there is a general lack of accountability from leaders in both democracies and authoritarian regimes. However, there is some good news: according to a report by the Atlantic Council, Ukraine has increased its score from 33 to 36 in the past year, which TI rates as one of the most considerable improvements globally.
Bulgaria and its connections with Russia & Corruption.
Bulgaria has a long and fraught history as a country where corruption has thrived for many years. According to an article in Forbes, Bulgaria is one of the only members of the EU that has not imposed sanctions on the Russian Federation as a state and on Russian individuals. Even Hungary, led by Viktor Orban, has imposed sanctions on Russia. Bulgaria’s lack of movement on sanctions is mainly because the government has close links to Russia at a governmental level and with the oligarchs. According to a report by the European Council on Foreign Relations, one of the main reasons for such a high level of influence is because of an attempted political coup by Russia in 2016. While the coup failed, like it did in Montenegro, it showed that Bulgarian society faces a massive challenge in eradicating Russian influence.
Update on Arevalo.
Back in August, I wrote a piece on the newly elected president of Guatemala, Bernardo Arevalo, who positioned himself as an anti-corruption activist. Last week, Arevalo was finally inaugurated, but only after a last-ditch attempt by his opponents to challenge his authority. According to an article in the New York Times, his opponents in Congress passed a budget that would severely restrict his ability to spend government funds on healthcare and education, two of his main priorities. There have also been numerous legal challenges by his conservative opponents, including a threat to arrest his vice president Karin Herrera on seemingly spurious and politically motivated challenges. In the coming months, Arevalo and Herrera will face further challenges to their authority from conservative opponents and organized criminal threats.
Update on Singapore Corruption.
Last July, Singapore, a country not traditionally known as a hotbed for corruption, indicted their transport minister on corruption and bribery charges. Yesterday, Subramanian Iswaran formally resigned from his post. According to a report by Reuters, Iswaran allegedly took bribes from a Singaporean property magnate called Ong Beng Seng. Records show that in return for advancing Seng’s business interests, Iswaran received tickets to sporting events and musicals and flights on Seng’s private jet. This all comes as a major surprise because, according to Transparency International, Singapore is ranked in the top five of the least corrupt countries in the world, paying their cabinet ministers some of the highest salaries in the world. Iswaran’s fate is still unknown, but one has to assume that Singapore will use him as an example to future ministers of what happens when you take bribes.
Crispin Corruption Report 