The fight against corruption is not a losing battle, Public Service and Administration Minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi said on Thursday.
”This is not a losing battle … we are seeing a greater determination to combat corruption,” she told reporters in Johannesburg. ”When corruption is brought out into the open … it does not mean we are losing the battle; to the contrary, it means we are winning.”
The minister was speaking in Sandton at the end of the fifth Global Forum on Fighting Corruption. Delegates from more than 100 countries attended the four-day event.
A declaration outlining the obligations of participating countries to curb corruption was adopted on Thursday.
Asked if the document did not merely amount to more rhetoric, she said there was ”clear development in terms of the where it [the forum] started and where we are today”.
Institute for Security Studies researcher Hennie van Vuuren said the test for the forum’s success will be whether the declaration is put into effect in participating countries.
”The way South Africa managed to negotiate the declaration on a multilateral level was reasonable,” he said. ”But the test is in the implementation and whether there will be critical reflection on the level of implementation — which was not done in the past.”
Not enough has been done to deal with the key issue of monitoring, he said.
Transparency International delegate Silke Pfeiffer said discussions did not provide enough information on how the anti-corruption measures could be introduced. ”It portrayed how society should look … but it did not address how we can overcome the challenges,” she said. ”How do we overcome the lack of political will or vested interests?”
Van Vuuren said there are signs of political will in South Africa. ”[But] clearly there are those that are benefiting [from corruption] and they are serious impediments in that sector.”
Iranian Deputy First President Hossein Samsami said international cooperation is vital for the declaration to be put into effect. ”We cannot expect results in the short run … it requires long-term planning,” he said. — Sapa