The World Bank is organizing the Anti-Corruption Alliance Forum in Abidjan until June 16th. Government investigative agencies, the private sector, and political leaders from a hundred countries take part in this meeting to better exchange on good practices.
The first objective of this forum is to raise awareness about the impact of corruption on the economy. The leaders present at this meeting admit that corruption engulfs a good part of the development programs.
“It is estimated that every year, the African continent loses around $80 billion in illicit funding that could be dedicated and invested in the development of our continent,” says Olavo Correia, Deputy Prime Minister of Cape Verde.
For its part, the World Bank has set up a control system to see how its projects are managed. And according to Mouhamadou Diagne, vice president of the Integrity program, many cases of fraud are detected and analyzed in this way.
“Last year we received over 4,000 reports and our responsibility is to pursue all of these allegations. We conduct rigorous investigations and when these allegations are substantiated, there is a whole process of sanctions to punish the companies and individuals concerned”. Added Olavo Correia.
In recent years, the World Bank has sanctioned more than 1,100 companies and individuals to prevent corruption from tainting development projects.