Burma in the relegation zone
on My Thai (Thailand), 06/Jul/2011 03:30, 34 days ago
For those who aren’t aware of it and have any interest, check out the Transparency International website here:http://www.transparency.org/policy_research/surveys_indices/cpi/2010/interactiveTransparency International has been examining the levels of public sector corruption in countries around the world for several years. By using a range of independent assessments, their yearly Corruptions Perception Index is able to rank countries in a comparable way. They look at issues such as the bribery of officials, embezzlement of public funds and the existence and effectiveness of any anti-corruption measures in place. The countries included are then scored on a scale from 10 (squeaky clean utopia) to 0 (hellhole).Yes, it is‘perceptions’ rather than hard evidence but, unsurprisingly, not many countries want to publish records of the number of times they’ve scammed the honest working man within a given year. Still, it serves as a good indicator of political power vs. people power and is a useful tool to hold up against public perceptions.Plus it’s all glossy and colourful so even muppets like me can understand it.As a visual snapshot, it’s alarming just how many countries are classed as ‘corrupt’.The UK ranked 20thwith a score of 7.6: I like to think of it as akin to Eurovision– we’ll never make it to the top however hard we try.After a brief gloat at ranking higher than the US, look right down the list..........keep going..........bit further..........nearly there..........Bingo!Hello Burma (or Myanmar, to use the junta’s preferred name).Out of 178 countries, Burma ranks joint 176thwith Afghanistan, with only Somalia scoring lower at 1.1.Despite sharing borders with Bangladesh, India, China, Laos and Thailand, Burma is in many ways a very isolated country. As testament to this, only 3 of the 10 independent sources used by Transparency International were available for the country– the lowest number needed for inclusion in the index. So little concrete information is available, so little accurate and unbiased data, that it’s difficult to gather a true picture of the situation.The following facts are known:More than 10% of children die before their 5thbirthday.Less than 50% of children within Burma complete a primary school education.Less than 1.1% of the country’s GDP is spent on education. Burma receives aid inflows 75 times less than those in Mozambique and 26 times lower than those in nearby Cambodia.I can’t add anything to that.The facts speak for themselves.