Poll shows corruption perception remains high

TIRANA, May 5 – The Albanian public’s experience and perception of corruption remains extremely high, a study funded by the United States has found.
Roughly 91.8 per cent of the respondents in the survey think that corruption among public officials is either “widespread” or “somewhat widespread”.
The study was conducted by the Institute for Development and Research Alternatives, IDRA, funded by USAID, the United States Agency for International Development.
According to the poll, out of 20 institutions rated by the general public in the 2010 survey, religious leaders, the president, media, military, public school teachers and NGO leaders are perceived as the least corrupt, while custom officials, tax officials, ministers, parliamentarians and doctors, on the other hand, are perceived as the most corrupt.
The survey found that overall, the Albanian public thinks that institutions are not doing enough to fight corruption.
Of the nine institutions evaluated in the survey only the media is seen as contributing to the fight against corruption, with 62.4 points on a scale of zero to 100, while all other institutions are given less than 50 points on the scale.
Religious leaders, the High Inspectorate for the Declaration and Audit of Assets, and the courts are seen as the least helpful in the fight against corruption, while overall trust in public institutions remains very low.
Only the military receive a passing grade as trustworthy out of twenty institutions rated by the respondents in the survey, while political parties were the least trusted institution.
Trust in the judicial system has declined from 2009, after having increased steadily from 2005.
In this year’s survey, only 35.9 per cent of respondents said that they trust the judicial system either “a lot” or to “some” degree, 10.7 percentage points lower than in 2009. The proportion of respondents who trust the judiciary “a little” or “not at all” remains high at 64.1 per cent.
The courts’ treatment of citizens has also deteriorated from 2009 figures, with 38 per cent of those surveyed who dealt with the courts responded that they were treated “poorly” or “very poorly”.
This is 11.3 percentage points worse than in 2009. 79.7 per cent of respondents declare that it is difficult to get information from the courts; a slide of 10.2 points from 2009.
In 2010, those surveyed report to have been victimized on average in 1.31 out of 10 possible ways.
The corruption victimization index has not changed from 2009; however it is still lower than in 2005, when the reported direct experience with corruption was 1.7 ways out of 10.
The health sector still remains the most often cited for bribery. In 2010, 33.5 per cent of respondents said they had offered a bribe to a doctor or a nurse.