A Tribute to The Corrupt

By Greg Li

Content note: there are mentions of war, homicide, dismemberment of bodies, abuse within a corrupted justice system, prostitution, and general oppression in relation to corruption. Although nothing is described in a graphic way, please take care when reading. 

Research note: All information regarding the Corruption Perception Index, the numeric data, the definition of the CPI, its scope and limitations, was obtained from the Transparency International website. Citation: Corruption Perceptions Index (2024) by Transparency International is licensed under CC-BYND 4.0. All other information was obtained from publicly accessible sources. 

Well, corruption is all over the world. South Sudan is part of the world. So it cannot be free of corruption. 

This is how he answered the question when asked whether he refuted the fact that South Sudan is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. 

Michael Makuei Lueth, the Spokesperson of the current South Sudanese government, was interviewed by the British correspondent, Isobel Yeung. The interview was conducted as a part of the production of the documentary VICE on corruption in South Sudan. This documentary attempts to view the ongoing civil war and consequent issues of civilian displacement and human rights violations, through the eyes of the South Sudanese government. Facing the camera, Makuei answered the question very calmly as though he had been anticipating the question for a long time. Maybe he had been asked the question multiple times by other reporters. 

However, the correspondent wasn’t satisfied. She knew that based on the Corruption Perception Index, South Sudan ranks last amongst the 180 states and territories listed, with a score of eight out of a hundred. Clearly wanting him to admit in plain language that his country is the most corrupt in the world, she asked him on a scale whether South Sudan is up there as one of the most corrupt countries in the world. To this, he replied, South Sudan is one of the corrupt countries in the world. Not the most. 

From the outset, the interview seemed to be an instance where the South Sudanese government spokesperson was cornered by an uncompromising correspondent who desperately wanted him to admit that his country was the world’s most corrupt. However, earlier in the interview, Makuei said that the current state of South Sudan on human rights was okay and he refuted Yeung’s claim that the reason why the civilians had been displaced was because of human rights violations. When Yeung mentioned the reports on the mass killing and rapes of civilians, Makuei’s eyes glinted as he declared that the reports weren’t credible, and that they were “written in the hotels”, implying that they were written by foreigners who did not live in South Sudan and therefore did not have a holistic understanding of the current state of affairs. 

Why did she want him to admit that so badly? Why did she refuse to accept any other answer? With her mind set on this, she tried to pose the question in various ways but still couldn’t get Makuei to cooperate. But what would it have achieved if Makuei had said, fine, South Sudan is the most corrupt country in the world. What then? Does this solve the problem of displaced civilians and violation of human rights? Does this end the civil war? Does pointing out to the politicians that they are corrupt change their course of action? Do they know that corruption is bad? Yes, they do. But they justify it to themselves that their gain is more important than anyone else’s. 

*

People like to compare and rank. They like to attribute a number, a value to things so that they can compare and rank them. 

They calculate the gross domestic product per capita of each country and attribute the numbers to them so that they can compare the value of the goods and services produced by each country.

They calculate the Gini index of each country and attribute a number between zero and one to them so that they can compare the income inequality of each country. 

They count how many countries to which each country’s citizens have visa-free access and attribute a number to each country so that they can compare the strength of each country’s citizenship, as if the number of countries a person can access without a visa is the sole determinant of the worth of their citizenship. 

In the same way, they calculate the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) of each country and attribute a number between zero and a hundred to them so that they can compare the perceived corruption of each country. 

People like to compare and rank. They seem to procure joy from reducing the complex world to mere numbers, compacting the data into small, bite-size pieces to ease the load on their limited brains, because one number can only be larger, smaller, or equal to another one. They can ostensibly understand a nation through numbers so that they don’t have to grapple with the details – how the numbers were calculated; what the circumstances are in the country that made it have this number, because that’s simply too complicated for their brain, and that way they cannot compare. 

South Sudan got a CPI of eight in 2024. The number eight is lower than any other numbers on the list of countries, so South Sudan is ranked last. Like the voice of a commentator at a sporting event, this is the voice inside their head when they read about corruption ranking. Comparison between numbers is easily done. It’s convenient, impersonal, distant, and devoid of details. Without the numbers, they cannot say that country A is more so and so than country B. Without the numbers, they become upset, because the game of comparison can’t be played when there are only those boring lines of descriptions of what a country is like; the qualitative, rather than quantitative, data. Suddenly their brain cannot handle this and all the fun is lost. 

Such was the feeling Yeung experienced when Makuei refused to play the comparison game. Maybe South Sudan is the most corrupt country in the world, since it was ranked last. But does that matter? Does the number, the ranking, and the comparison matter when the tangible issues aren’t resolved? Although disappointed, as an experienced correspondent, Yeung changed her tactics. Ditching the low-hanging fruits of numbers and comparison, she reached for some qualitative data by asking whether Makuei thought that he himself was corrupt. At the question, Makuei asked, me? As if he was surprised by the question. Then he confirmed without a shadow of a doubt and with apparent sincerity and honesty on his face, no, I’m not corrupt. An answer that Yeung might have not expected. 

*

I grew up being told that my country is corrupt. That is not Australia. It’s the country my family came from. Although, Australia is also corrupt. 

I was told when my grandparents were young, their family used to be farmers and they used to own blocks of land. In the 1950s, their land was confiscated by the newly formed government to establish what was called the people’s commune. The scheme was put in place to collectivise the land, the equipment, and the workforce. Everything belonged to the people. However, the state was to be responsible for the distribution of the produce. This plan, designed to increase the efficiency in production, was discontinued because of famine. Why? Maybe the collectivisation scheme was inefficient in the first place, or the politicians ate all the food.

My father told me at some point the national government decided to increase the amount of pension my grandfather was receiving as a war veteran. But months went by, no extra money came. When some of the veterans went to the local government who was responsible for distributing the funding, they were ordered to go home. A number of them insisted and were locked up in a prison cell so small that their bodies were squished against each other. With no space to sit or lie down, they stood there for three days and three nights. No food, no water, no toilets. After being released, they swallowed their shame and indignation and never dared to go back. Where did the money go? Maybe the politicians shoved it in their pockets.

I was told there was a time my father owned a business. He used to renew his business licence every year and once in a while his factory would be inspected. He was the most anxious and irritable as the expiry date of his licence drew near, because depending on whether the government official was satisfied with his “gift”, in whatever form it takes, his licence may or may not be renewed. Some days he’d not come back home before I’d gone to bed. And the next morning, I’d find him grumpy, sleepy, and hungover, his breath reeking of alcohol. Later on I’d find out these were the days his factory was inspected. He’d spent the night with the inspectors, taken them out for dinner, bought alcohol for them, entertained them, and when he had enough to drink and was already drunk, they’d asked him to drink more and threatened to report him if he didn’t. I wondered what they gained from forcing my father to drink. Years later, the answer I came up with was that it was an exercise of power, superiority, and condescension. They could ridicule him more when he was drunk; and through that they quenched their thirst for power. They’d asked my father to take them to sing karaoke or to a communal bath-house and make him pay for their expenses. When I first heard the story as a teenager, I wondered how immature these government officials were, until I came to know what they were really doing there. The answer was not that they were immature. They were very mature. So mature that what happened behind the walls of the karaoke bar and the bath-house was striptease and prostitution. The answer was that their mind was so corrupt that each and every fibre of their being was evil and disgusting.

When I was sixteen, my parents paid a deposit of an equivalent of thirty thousand dollars for an apartment unit. It was a new subdivision on the edge of the city that the government was developing. The deal was that the buyer would pay the deposit first as the construction took place. A contract was signed for the apartment to be completed by a certain day. But a few months later, whoever was responsible for the development of that subdivision disappeared. Many angry buyers stormed the local government office and many of them were arrested. Nobody got their money back. Why was the construction discontinued? Maybe not enough people were interested in the apartment so they didn’t have enough funding. Why couldn’t they refund the money? Maybe they’d already spent all the deposit money on the half-built, dilapidated building, which perhaps still stands there today. Maybe some people wanted to bulk up their already-fat wallets. 

When we came to Australia, mum and dad told me that we were fleeing the corrupt government. The concept of corruption I had was only from stories similar to these. But whenever I was asked why we migrated to Australia, the answer I gave had always been the one I was told – to escape corruption. 

Once I was visiting two friends from Hong Kong – an elderly couple that migrated in the 1970s. When they casually asked me why my family decided to move to Australia, I gave them the answer I’d always given; the answer I’d always taken for granted; an answer that had never met any scrutiny in any conversation I’d had so far. But this time I was met with their scrupulous, inquisitive gaze as if they were confused by what I’d just said. With locked eyebrows, they told me there’s also corruption in Australia. If there’s no corruption in Australia, why is there a National Anti-Corruption Commission here? They asked me. 

Corruption is all over the world. Australia is part of the world. So it cannot be free of corruption. 

You essentially cannot escape corruption. It is all over the world, as Makuei said. 

I never said there’s no corruption in Australia. I knew there was. So I told them there was less corruption in Australia than where my family came from. 

See? I liked to play the comparison game as well. 

*

For a country to have a CPI of a hundred, it needs to be perceived as completely free of public sector corruption. In 2024, the highest scoring country had a ninety. They are not free of corruption. But are they less corrupt than South Sudan? Perhaps.

The CPI is an index calculated and published by Transparency International and its website defines it as how corrupt each country’s public sector is perceived to be. Currently, it is the most widely used global corruption ranking in the world. For each country’s CPI to be calculated, Transparency International processes data drawn from thirteen corruption surveys and assessments conducted by experts and businesspeople in the field. The data sources cover public sector corruption such as bribery and officials using their public office for private gain without facing consequences (e.g. the corrupt business licence office and the factory inspectors in my father’s story); diversion of public funds and laws ensuring that public officials must disclose their finances and potential conflicts of interest (e.g. where my grandfather’s pension and my parents’ deposit went); etc. However, the CPI does not cover corruption in private sectors, informal economies and markets, or citizens’ direct perceptions or experience of corruption. 

Australian individuals and businesses commit tax fraud everyday and that’s why they like to be paid in cash and encourage us to pay in cash. We receive scam text messages and emails everyday. Scammers phish for personal information and commit identity fraud to procure illicit financial gain. The housing market is so competitive that the landlords are free to list their properties at whatever price they see fit. Supermarkets like Coles and Woolworths are price gouging and cheating their customers. They raise the prices of essential products when the demand is high. They double the original price and put on a thirty-percent-off promotion tag to increase sales. The issue is so severe and far-reaching that our Prime Minister has announced that his government is funding the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission to investigate price gouging in an effort to make it illegal. These are the issues some countries with a high CPI like Australia are experiencing. 

Why are these things not measured? I would argue that the private sector is where corruption affects the citizens the most. It directly affects their ability to thrive because the cost of living is going up. The citizens don’t care whether there are laws that protect people who report bribery and corruption; they don’t bother getting any information on public affairs and government activities or nepotism in the government office or politicians using their office and power for private gains when private sector businesses are corrupt and they are being ripped off whenever they go to the supermarket or rent a house. The CPI does not measure the citizens’ direct perception or experience of corruption. Isn’t this the most important aspect? How much corruption each person is experiencing tangibly every day and how they are negatively affected by it.

If the CPI doesn’t measure that, does it reflect the actual level of corruption, then? 

Transparency International states on their website that to date there is no index that directly measures the “real” levels of corruption in all of its manifestations in each country. This is the case because corruption is generally hidden and only comes to light through scandals, investigation, and prosecution. So despite the reliability and objectivity from drawing data from multiple sources and undergoing thorough review by external bodies, it only reflects the level of corruption in public sectors. It cannot be used as an indicator for how much corruption there is in a country. 

Back to Isobel Yeung. She insisted that Makuei should admit that South Sudan is the most corrupt country in the world when the only thing she was basing her argument on is the fact that South Sudan scored the lowest on CPI. Transparency International indicated in its FAQ page that the country with the lowest score is not necessarily the world’s most corrupt nation, because the CPI is an indicator of perceptions of public sector corruption. It is not a verdict on the levels of corruption of entire nations or societies, or of their policies, or the activities of their private sector. Furthermore, citizens of those countries that score at the lower end of the CPI often show the same concern about and condemnation of corruption as the public in countries that perform strongly. Therefore, a high CPI doesn’t mean there’s in general less corruption in the country. A low CPI doesn’t necessarily mean people are more affected by corruption in their lives. In other words, maybe South Sudan’s government administration is perceived as the most corrupt, but it cannot be considered the most corrupt country in the world. 

In the end, the CPI doesn’t really mean anything for the general public. 

This is not to say that the CPI is useless. It’s useful in the sense that it provides insights into how clean a government is perceived to be. So it should be thought of as such. We need to understand that those countries with a high CPI might just be really good at hiding their corruption, and those with a low CPI might just be less hypocritical by not hiding their corruption. It’s not a gold standard, comprehensive measurement of corruption, because corruption can’t be accurately measured. But in reality, how often does it fall into misconception and become a way of manipulating people into thinking their country is inferior?

At the end of the day, maybe there’s nothing wrong with the game of comparison. But we shouldn’t think of a country as just a number or a dot on a ranking. It’s the lives of the people, the future of a country.

*

The premise of her question is wrong. However, is there any point in Yeung asking the question in the first place? 

Yes, there is. And it’s for the same reason why all these rankings were made in the first place. 

The concept of the CPI was created in 1995 when Transparency International commissioned The University of Passau’s in Germany to collect data and produce a CPI for each country. As years went by, the data collection became more complex and sophisticated. For the sake of reliability and objectivity, they said. Transitioning from the public opinion surveys they originally conducted in each country, they now use data from thirteen different surveys and assessments produced by twelve institutions; two of them are located in Hong Kong and Ivory Coast in Africa; the rest are based either in Europe or the United States. To ensure a final touch of “objectivity”, independent evaluators that are part of the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission regularly review the production of the CPI. 

So yes, Yeung wanted Makuei and his government to come to their senses and reinstate peace in South Sudan. Meanwhile, she was so engrossed in the ranking and comparison; so absorbed in her superiority complex; so obsessed with making Makuei feel inferior that she forgot that her own country is as corrupt as Makuei’s. It’s just corrupt in different ways – the unseen ways. Perhaps she never understood that in the first place. 

*

Back to the migrants who fled corruption in pursuit of a better life. A friend told me when she was in school in her home country, a classmate often ranted about how corrupt the government was and how oppressed he’d felt. He was not oppressed, she told me in a matter-of-fact tone. Later on she told me that one time she terrorised a guy when he took four lollies when he was supposed to take only one from the pile that was to be shared by the class. She looked him in the eyes and accused him of being corrupt and told him to never talk to her about corruption again. If someone is corrupt with lollies, how much more potential a person has to be corrupt with something so tempting as money. 

Human beings are inherently corrupt. Nobody is exempt. One might say, oh I’d never embezzle a million dollars, but they eat more than they need at a buffet. This is called greed. Though greed is on the lower end of the spectrum in terms of gravity, it is an instigator of corruption. When they say their government is greedy, selfish, and corrupt, while being all of the above themselves; when they think they can escape corruption just by moving to a different country, they are fooling themselves. Such people can search the world to look for a place where corruption hasn't reached and they won’t find one. And if a country actually doesn’t have corruption, it would when ten thousand people like them move there. Ten thousand people who take four lollies instead of one when nobody is looking. 

Some people are more affected by corruption in their country than others and some might be able to find a better life in another country where corruption doesn’t affect them as much. I’m not saying people shouldn’t flee from corruption when it’s creeping into their lives and draining their wealth. If they get to go somewhere to seek a better life, by all means. But a utopic, idealistic, corruption-free world only exists in some people’s childish dreams. 

Sometimes people have to give up everything they have back home and start their life from scratch. When corruption is draining their livelihood and they are on the brink of being suffocated to death, they might find hope in this country where corruption doesn’t affect them, where they can lead a peaceful life. They may be under the impression that this country doesn’t have corruption. Then someone comes their way, gently but sternly lectures them on how corruption is everywhere and how they can never flee from it and that where they live now is as bad as where they’re from. Their last glimmer of hope to not be oppressed is snuffed out. Their old scab is ripped off violently and salt and pepper sprinkled on top. They get told that their thinking is flawed; that there is corruption in Australia as well; that they’d be better off staying where they were from; that they’d sacrificed their lives back home for nothing. 

You don’t know that. Let them be. You don’t know what they’ve been through. 

When life is tough in a new country, they don’t need a lecture; they need empathy. When someone has found a place where they can live a peaceful life, we should be happy for them.

*

People can leave their country in pursuit of a place with a fairer society. South Sudanese refugees can seek protection in Australia. But let’s not normalise it. There is war in some parts of Africa and some people are oppressed, but it’s not the epicentre of corruption, and it should not be thought of as one. It’s not a place where everyone should flee from at their first opportunity. It’s home to hundreds of millions of people who should live there peacefully. The United Nations (UN) peacekeepers can set up barriers along the fronts of civil war to protect the South Sudanese. Western powers can tell the government off for being corrupt. But let’s remember how the West reacted when Patrice Lumumba became the first Prime Minister of the Democratic Republic of the Congo on June 30, 1960. 

Only ten days later, under the pretext of protecting its citizens from the violence that erupted due to disagreements between the Congolese government and its army over the issue of the independence of Katanga Province, Belgium sent six thousand troops to take control of the area, which was rich in natural resources. Later that day, the Belgian Navy bombed Matadi, the capital of the Central Province, after evacuating its citizens. Nineteen Congolese civilians were killed. In the days that followed, the Belgian Army advanced and controlled multiple cities in the Congo, including its capital at the time, Léopoldville.

This is how the West reacts when a country gains its independence and sovereignty and has successfully elected a Prime Minister. They send armed forces to launch an attack, and set up strongholds around the precious resources. 

On December 1, Lumumba’s wife and children were captured by the Congolese Army leader Mobutu after he and his associates had crossed the Sankuru River. Despite persuasion from his associates, Lumumba decided to go back to the other bank of the river. He walked himself into captivity. He was tortured, beaten, and starved. On the night of January 17, 1961, firing squads were assembled under the command of a Belgian officer Julien Gat and a Belgian Police Commissioner Frans Verscheure to execute Lumumba along with two of his associates. A shallow grave was quickly dug and their bodies thrown in. 

When a country is on its way to self-sufficiency, peace, and prosperity; when a country wants to gain control over its own minerals and expel foreign troops and western influence, they slaughter its leader, for the sake of the repression of communism. They do it under the pretext of a necessity for civil conflicts to resolve. They do it under the names of the Congolese leaders lest their hands be sullied and tainted. 

The next morning, fearing the bodies would be discovered, the Katangan leaders wanted to make Lumumba’s body disappear. So a team led by the Belgian Gendarmerie officer Gerard Soete heartlessly dug up the bodies, dismembered the parts, soaked them in sulfuric acid so that the flesh dissolved. They ground the bones to dust and scattered the dust. 

When a country is about to rise, the West, fearing that they would lose their control over the precious uranium, gladly becomes the accomplice in the gruesome act of homicide and disappearance of the leader of independence. 

After Lumumba’s death and disappearance, the United States and the United Kingdom, delighted that Belgium had done the dirty work for them, abandoned their plan of assassination. 

This is what they do when they want African countries to not be corrupt, because at the end of the day, what they want isn’t a clean government cabinet or a developed Africa. What they want is an Africa under their control; an Africa where each country has the impression of being a sovereign nation when this sovereignty can be tuned and adjusted by the West like turning the temperature dial on their oven whenever they feel their interests are threatened. When the country erupts into war for whatever reason, they condemn the government for being corrupt and flash out the numbers and the fancy calculations of the CPI while the UN dispatches peacekeepers and the global superpowers provide humanitarian aids because they need to put on a face that shows that they care. But the truth is, they don’t care whether Africa is corrupt or whether there are wars. They only want to make sure that their mineral-rich backyard is safe in their hands, not the Africans’.

I do not wish to see a corruption-free Africa, because that would be impossible. One day, I hope to see an Africa without the oppression from western imperialism and see it not through the lenses tainted by the West.

By Greg Li