When anti-corruption activism and art intersect

On 9 December, International Anti-Corruption Day (IACD), Corruption Watch (CW) took to the streets again as part of its activism work on that day. Well, we took to a particular street corner – Jan Smuts Avenue and Empire Road – for a morning of colour, creativity, and paint. Johannesburg residents will be instantly aware that Read more >

Corruption is a crime against humanity, says Bekel-Thomas

By Kwazi Dlamini Resident UN coordinator in South Africa Nardos Bekel-Thomas warned that when impunity becomes the culture and crimes of corruption are not addressed, it makes citizens lose confidence in democracies, and erodes the legitimacy of government. She was speaking at the annual commemoration of International Anti-Corruption Day (IACD) hosted on the day, 9 Read more >

Youth report reveals their vulnerability to corruption

The theme of this year’s International Anti-Corruption Day (IACD) is Recover with Integrity. The event is held annually on 9 December and was set up by the UN to raise awareness of the devastating impact of corruption, and to look back on the year and assess progress in the fight to eradicate the scourge. While Read more >

Download our FunDza youth stories as e-books!

Between 2015 and 2018 we published a series of six corruption-related stories aimed at our youth supporters. The stories were developed in collaboration with the FunDza Literacy Trust, and reflect real-life scenarios that many young people find themselves in. Problems with an NSFAS student loan, exposing driver’s licence corruption, deciding whether to blow the whistle Read more >

Thinking of blowing the whistle? Read this first

By Kwazi Dlamini British philosopher John Stuart Mill once said, “Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing.” In South Africa in the recent past, corruption and dishonest individuals have thrived under the unobservant eye of their peers, while those who are watchful of Read more >

New report on reform strategies in open contracting

The Government Transparency Institute and Transparency International Health Initiative (TIHI) recently published a report focusing on open contracting in low- to middle-income countries (LMIC), with a specific focus on reform strategies for the procurement space. Public contracting is the world’s largest marketplace, with $13-trillion changing hands every year – but opacity and secrecy means that for Read more >

Latest edition of mining risk assessment tool has gender focus

Image: Solomon Star The third edition of Transparency International Australia’s (TI-A) Mining Awards Corruption Risk Assessment (Macra) tool is now live, and released as part of the organisation’s Accountable Mining Programme. Macra helps users to identify and assess the underlying causes of corruption in mining sector awards. These risks create opportunities for corruption and undermine Read more >

How the Fishrot scandal robbed Namibia of millions

Image: WikiLeaks In part one of our Fishrot Files mini-series we read about the experiences of whistle-blower Jóhannes Stefánsson, the former MD of the Namibian branch of Icelandic fishing company Samherji. After Stefánsson’s 2016 departure from the company, he handed over a cache of 30 000 revealing documents to Al Jazeera and WikiLeaks. The latter Read more >

Fishrot whistle-blower did it despite the risks

In 2014 the stench of corruption began to rise from the operations of Icelandic fishing company Samherji in Namibia, and its former MD Jóhannes Stefánsson noticed. Two years later, he left his job to expose an extensive cash-for-quota scandal through a trove of 30 000 documents and e-mail correspondence handed over to WikiLeaks, who made Read more >