1 in 5 Africans forced to pay bribes for police, health care, education

Nigerian Catholics pray and worship during morning mass April 12, 2005 in Kano, Nigeria. Kano is part of Nigeria's primarily Muslim north, but devoted Catholic minority participates in frequent Masses in local cathedrals. Cardinal Francis Arinze of Nigeria is considered a leading contender to become pope in the aftermath of the death of Pope John Paul II. (Photo by Chris Hondros/Getty Images)

Almost one in five Africans were forced to pay a bribe in the past year just to get basic public services, a major survey said Thursday.

In Sierra Leone — the worst affected country — almost two thirds of people said they had given money to public officials for permits, access to health care and school, according to the “Let the People Have Their Say” report by Afrobarometer. Morocco, Guinea and Kenya were close behind.
To compile the report, Afrobarometer surveyed 51,000 Africans across 34 countries.

The institution rated most corrupt across the whole continent was the police. Alex Vines, head of the Africa Program at Chatham House, said the figures displayed a policing “crisis” in Africa. Nigeria, Kenya and Sierra Leone rated the worst for police corruption.

“If you were to take a group of young people in Africa and say, ‘Someone has burgled your house,’ the majority would not phone the police,” he said. “They would rather go to someone else they might know who could sort it out.

“Policing across much of Africa is in crisis. So you get informal police forces in place of the official ones which aren’t doing their job. Vigilante policing provides the protection that the police fail to do.”
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