Joe Sambou/Kebba Dampha,

I wish that it would be possible to eradicate corruption in our midst.  You
will agree with me that what international financial institutions and the
private enterprises can do, at best, is to minimise and control it.  This
is what the AfDB and similar institutions are attempting to do.  I try to
show what the African Bank is doing in this regard and as you (Joe) have
indicated similar institutions have similar policies.  How effective are
these policies? They can be as effective as all the payers would like them
to be; government officials, private operators, donor community,
beneficiaries, borrowers, lenders, law enforcement agencies including the
judiciary,
would like them to be.  As Dampha has enumerated in his piece,
numerous things can and do go wrong when the procurement rules are being
applied. One way that the Bank tries to respond to this problem is to
increase the number of supervision missions per project.  Pre-Kabbaj years,
some AfDB projects were never supervised during the life of the project,
which averaged between 5-6 years.  Now, the figure is up to 1.5 missions
per project per year.  A target of 2 missions per project per year could be
reached after a second restructuring of the Bank, which is expected to take
place shortly.  The measurement of the effectiveness of the policy is more
complex and tricky especially when there are numerous projects involved and
financed by a multitude of donors, sometimes working on cross-purposes with
different procurement rules and procedures.  From a practical stand point
however, I would settle for effectiveness criteria that m
easure the
frequency of complaints from bidders, consistency in the application of the
bidding criteria, the evaluation report of the bid in question and a host
of other issues too numerous to enumerate here.  Suffice it to say that the
efforts of a regional Bank such as the AfDB is hardly enough to prevent
and/or control corruption. The efforts of all similar institution and
organisations such as Transparency International working in tandem through
the sharing of information, exchanging ideas on combating this malaise and
harmonising our rules governing procurement is absolutely imperative if our
individual policies can bear the desired result.

The AfDB project proceeds in all other RMCs must be deposited in their
respective Central Banks Special (and separate) accounts for each
operation. There is no exception to this rule.  Bank rules do not allow
project loan proceeds to be deposited in foreign accounts, The G
ambia
included. Due to the regional nature of the AfDB, its limited capabilities
in terms of size and staff mix has made it necessary, and through mutual
agreement, that the IMF takes the lead in monetary matters because it
better endowed (financially, politically and in terms of expertise),
although the AfDB do participate in joint missions with the IMF and the
Work Bank.

Joe and Dampha, barley a decade ago, the mere mention of the word
corruption in development literature was taboo.  Now, it is acceptable and
indeed desirable to deal with it face on without mincing words or using
codified language.  This in itself is a significant step forward in our
determination to prevent the scourge from dismembering our already fragile
economies, rendering all of us destitute.

Have a good weekend.

Sidi Sanneh

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