Kenyan pilot project to fight bribery

Officials will now be ranked by the public in effort to battle corruption

The performance of public workers in Africa will be rated by the public if a pilot anti-corruption project in Kenya is successful.

The project, known as Huduma Halisi (Honest Public Service), aims at increasing public engagement in the anti-corruption fight. Citizens can report the quality of service offered in government institutions by sending a short message to a toll free number.

This will put greater scrutiny on more than 700,000 Kenyan public workers who will either be rewarded or disciplined depending on the number of cases received on the platform. Furthermore, the public will be able to comment on whether they have to pay a bribe to access services.

The move follows a commitment taken by the African Union heads of state and government at a summit in Nouakchott, Mauritania, last year. It was agreed that the campaign would be rolled out in all the member states. It recognizes that Africa's transformation depends on efficiency in the delivery of public service and citizen engagement.

Kenya is the first country to test the project. Selected by the UN Economic Commission of Africa, the country has previously undertaken public sector reform that brought sweeping changes in the quality of services offered by government institutions.

In addition, it compliments efforts by the government to fight corruption by promoting an ethos of transparency, trust and accountability in the delivery of public service.

Samuel Kimeu, executive direct-or of Transparency International in Kenya, said it was a necessary and timely effort. "The strategy aims at fighting corruption through building an integrity system that is the antithesis of corruption. When you build ethics and certainty and professionalism within service delivery, it boosts public confidence in institutions and the government."

Kimeu said the campaign's entry point is in service delivery to millions of people. However, a multipronged approach should be employed to increase the impact. Different strategies and campaigns should be happening simultaneously, he said, referring to China's anti-corruption efforts.

China vowed to crack down on both "tigers and flies" referring to powerful leaders and junior officials in a campaign against corruption while driving economic growth. Last year, more than 1.5 million corrupt officials were punished and 440 senior officials have been investigated since November 2012, according to Xinhua News Agency.

"Africa should therefore ground the agenda on policies and develop different strategies based on that. Huduma Halisi becomes one strategy. Others can also be used to target the political class, business communities and other segments," said Kimeu.

Transparency International's East African Bribery Index 2017, reported that, on average, 32 percent of respondents said they had to pay a bribe to hasten access of services in government institutions. Only 10 percent reported incidents of bribery to any authority or person. Rwanda had the highest proportion of respondents reporting at 15 percent.

When asked why they did not report any of the bribery incidents they encountered, a quarter of the respondents across the region felt no action would be taken to resolve their corruption complaints.

But allowing citizens to make a proactive effort of reviewing the quality of service delivery puts them in the center of the fight, Kimeu said. "It will cut down the distance between the government and citizens while enhancing service delivery."

The campaign also aims to increase youth confidence in their governments. Using SMS from their mobile phone is easy and immediate.