Increasing transparency and accountability in public service provision, through community-based monitoring and policy advocacy
Despite millions of dollars spent and National unity government commitments in fighting corruption, yet the country scored 15/100 in Corruption Perception Index (CPI) ranking in 4th place as of 2017 CPI of Transparency International (TI). Subsequently, there is no government agency in Afghanistan that is free of corruption, whereas in Nangarhar and Laghman provinces citizens are subject to serious corruption harm. A survey based study by Integrity Watch Afghanistan (IWA) in 2016 state “Afghans pay $ 3 billion in bribes annually” in addition the IWA study assessing the major problems in both provinces, 56% in Laghman and 70% in Nangarhar province cited corruption as major problem after insecurity and unemployment. Consequently, weak rule of law, ambition to become rich, low salary of civil servants are considered the main root cause of corruption in public sector. 39% strongly agree that corruption is worse in districts than the province. Weaknesses in the administrative system, the lack of sanctions, and a general culture of impunity are cited as the main facilitating factors for corruption. The most common practice of corrupt behavior by civil servants is to delay service delivery until a bribe is paid (mushkil-tarashi). A large majority of respondents indicated that 50-100% of government services commonly sought require some sort of corrupt practice. The Judiciary (Judges, prosecutors, courts) 70%, municipalities 38%, Labor and social affairs 32%, education 31%, district government and governors 22% and Health sector 20% were considered to be the most corrupt institution. The project will therefore focus on this narrow, but common area of malpractice. And sets a goal to increase transparency and accountability in the provision of public services in Nangarhar and Laghman provinces government departments.