Corruption in Africa: “the honest civil servant often pays for his probity at the price of virtual social exclusion”

Published on December 17, 2024

Lecture : 1 minute.

First, a clarification: yes, corruption is endemic in Africa, but, “Africa is a continent of egg thieves compared to thieves of Western, Eastern, Asian beef,” asserts François Soudan, speaking to RFI.

The editorial director of Young Africa returns, in La Semaine of JA, on the editorial he signed on this profound evil which undermines part of the continent’s development potential. “Africa is sans doubt the continent where daily corruption is the most diffuse and the best embedded in the dysfunctions of States, to the point to be experienced as a sort of inevitability that must be dealt with,” he notes.

The cost of probity

To the point that, for a civil servant, the probity can come at an exorbitant cost. “There are many honest civil servants who refuse nepotism, privileges, bribes, in order to satisfy to apply the law, often pays the price of virtual social exclusion, as pressure from the environment pushes corruptive practices to become commonplace”, note François Soudan.

Anti-corruption operations, often politically exploited, in reality have little or no real effect. And for good reason: “Until we have summer treated the social, economic, cultural roots of evil, the fight against corruption will remain an obligatory antiphon of presidential speeches and organisations international, with no effect on reality. »

La Semaine de JA can be found every Saturday on RFI, and in full on the Young Africa.