ISLAMABAD - The Transparency International on Wednesday issued its annual report over corruption in 2012, raising the Pakistan rank from 42 to 33.
The 2012 index ranks 176 countries by their perceived levels of public sector corruption. The index assigns scores of between one and 100, 1 being highly corrupt and 100 clean.
The global civil society organisation has expressed concern over the growing corruption in the country, saying the corruption of Rs 12,600 billion was reported in different sectors of Pakistan during the last five years.
It reported the corruption peaked last year based on perspectives of business people and country experts.
The CPI scores and ranks countries/territories based on how corrupt a country’s public sector is perceived to be. It is a composite index, a combination of surveys and assessments of corruption, collected by a variety of reputable institutions. The CPI is the most widely used indicator of corruption worldwide.
The index scores 176 countries with a combination of surveys and assessments of corruption, collected by a variety of reputable institutions. It uses data from international surveys that look at factors such as accountability of national and local governments, effective enforcement of anti-corruption laws, access to government information and abuse of government ethics and conflict of interest rules.
Denmark, Finland, New Zealand, and Sweden top the list of countries in this year’s CPI as the least corrupt. While Afghanistan, North Korea and Somalia are at the bottom of the list.
Two thirds of the countries ranked in the 2012 index score below 50 on a scale from 0 (perceived to be highly corrupt) to 100 (perceived to be very clean) implying that levels of bribery and corruption are still very high.
Among the emerging economies, Brazil scores 43 with a rank of 69; China scores 39 with a rank of 80; India and Russia score 36 and 28, with a rank of 94 and 133, respectively. The Arab countries also score poorly underscoring the need for comprehensive reform in those countries and that simple changes in leadership are not sufficient.
The United States is ranked 19th with the scores of 74. This score is lower than many of its OECD partners such as Australia, Germany, Japan, and United Kingdom. The United States is also third below Canada and Barbados.