Fifth Global Forum on Reinventing Government – Innovation and Quality in the Government of the 21st Century

Mexico City – Mexico

3 – 6 November 2003

Transparency & Accountability in Government

Case of Jordan

Presented By

Dr. Zuhair Al-Kayed

General Secretary for the Higher population Council in Jordan

Presented In:Accountable & Transparent Government Workshop

5 – 6 November 2

Jordan In Figures

Selected Indicators

2002

Selected Indicators 2002Total Population (000) 5.329.0

Total Civil Servants 152 373

Total Ministries 20 (Oct. 2003)

Population Growth Rate (%) 2.8

Population Less Than 15 Years of Age (%) 37.8

Population Age 15-64 Years (%) 58.7

Population Age 65+ 3.5

Total Fertility Rate (for Women 15-49 Years of Age) 3.7

Infant Mortality Rate (Per 1000 Live Births) 22.1

Under Five Mortality Rate (per 1000 Live Births) 27.0

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Selected Indicators 2002Life Expectancy at Birth (Year) 71.5

Male 70.6

Female 72.4

Female/Male Students Ratio University 98.8

Illiteracy Rate (Population Age 15+ Years) 10.3

Male 5.4

Female 15.2

Unemployment Rate (%) 15.3

Inflation Rate (%) 1.8

GDP Growth Rate (Current Prices) (%) 5.3

GDP Growth (Constant Prices) (%) 4.9

GDP per capita (JD) 1.236.8Ministry of Education Budget of Total

Government Budget (%) 10.7

Ministry of Health Budget of Total Government Budget (%) 5.7

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1. Historical Background.

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2. Introduction:

In his letter of Designation to Prime Minister-designate Faisal Al-Fayez, October 23, 2003 His Majesty King Abdullah stated:

"We want honesty, accountability and transparency. We want effective and real participation by Jordanian women and Youth whose potential should be activated and invested in the different walks of life". "We want honesty, accountability and transparency.

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"….Reforms should also be accomplished through adminis-trative reforms that reward the hardworking, spur the reluctant and cast out the corrupt".

"The principle of absolute transparency, coupled with that of accountability and taking responsibility for performance are the Basis of success".

"The government which I want comprises of a prime minister and ministers who … act with transparency, and responds with broadmindedness to press … ministers should respect accountability and appreciate responsibility.

"…This necessitates that government decisions are made in a clear, institutionalized and transparent manner through all the necessary channels.

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3. Previous Efforts to Fight Corruption by the Government:

Article 3 in the 1952 Constitution.

Prosecution Law No. 16 of 1960. Classified Crimes against Public Mgt

The National Charter of 1990.

The Bureau of Administrative Control and Inspection 1992.

This Bureau had been merged with the Audit Bureau in 2002.

The Law of Economic Crimes 1993.

The Higher Procurement Authority 1994.

The Anti-Corruption Department 1996

The Higher Committee for Transparency & Accountability 2002.

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The National Committee for Combating Corruption & Favoritism

Major Domains:

1. Corruption (concept, causes, aspects and results).

2. Legislations.

3. Monitoring systems and its role in combating corruption.

4. Transparency and availability of data.

5. Finance and administration.

6. Criteria of the administrative performance monitoring.

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7. National system of values and integrity.

Corruption is defined as the misuse of public service in order to achieve private benefits, whether done by an

individual or a group of persons by means of violating laws & regulations.

Favoritism represents one form of corruption, and is presented by means of prejudice, bias and the unjust

commitment to laws and regulations for the benefit of individuals due to social, racial or beneficial reasons.

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Corruption Phenomenon in Jordan

- TI Report on corruption showed that Jordan was positioned below five out of the ten degrees scale.

- The Arab Institution for Investment Guarantee report issued on 1999 indicates that four Arab Countries, including Jordan, has positioned corruption combating as the highest priority for the purpose of enhancing investment atmosphere and environment in order to attract Arab & foreign investments.

- Several seminars, workshops and studies.

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- Amendment of Legislations.

Causes of Corruption

One: Legislative Causes:

- Exceptions in some Legislative Articles.

- Ambiguity of legal text in some cases.

- Failure of some legislations to follow up with some local & international economic & social changes.

- Numerousness of provisional laws and the lack of its applicability due to several amendments.

- Non compliance to legislations, especially by authority holding persons, as well as the incorrect implementation of the discretionary power granted by these legislations, and

violating instructions issued in accordance to legislations or its incorrect implementation.

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Two: Social Causes:

- Social habits and norms.

- Make intermediary as an element of favoritism.

- Big companies has produced eventually new social classes with specific interests.

- The lack of good citizenship attitude

- The lack of religious and ethical derivation, poverty, greed, feeling of injustice, and non equivalence of opportunities.

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Three: Political Causes:

- Lack of institutionalization of Political life.

Four: Administrative Causes:

- Administrative weakness.

- emergence of certain unethical norms among employees under the absence of accountability.

- Weakness of decentralization.

- Non acceptance of internal and external monitoring.

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Five: Economic Causes:

- Most administrative offenses and violence of laws and regulations are caused by economic reasons.

- From the beginning of eighties luxurious consumption patterns inadequate with income levels in Jordan became

popular.

- Increase of poverty and decrease of actual income of citizens.

- Implementation of some capital projects with no priority

- Absence of feasibility study for some implemented projects had led to wasting public money.

Aspects of Corruption:

1. Bribery and illegitimate commissions as well as larceny of public money in all aspects.

2. Favoritism, Intermediary in appointment decisions.

3. Performance draw back and low productivity of several governmental authorities accompanied by the cost increase of services provided to citizens, bad quality of these services, and the complexity of procedures which led to the high complaints of citizens.

4. Increase of the rate of Public Money Waste.

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5. Variance of Conversion, Forgery, Misuse and Bad administration of Public Money.

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6. Distributing & granting well, transportation lines, licenses, and telecommunication approvals in contradiction with required conditions.

7. Granting loans and aids by National Aid Fund, Development & Recruiting Fund, Zakat Fund for non feasible projects.

8. Non compliance to competition principle and quality of services during purchase.

9. Utilizing parts of grants and foreign aids as salaries and benefits rather than production which serve the National Economy.

10. Evasion of tax and fees payments due to the National Treasury.

11. Executing service projects such as road constructions for private benefits in contradiction with accredited fundamentals.

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Results of Corruption

1. Governments inability to implement its programs and policies and achieve its objectives as efficient and effective as requested.

2. Increase of the state's budget deficit.

3. Deprivation of poor in the society from development and getting better life quality.

4. Creation of incorrect options by encouraging competition to deal with bribery rather than competing on the quality

of low-price merchandises and services.

5. Deformation of Government's procedures & decisions by citizens due to their lack of trust.

6. Deformation of economic & social development.

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7. Increase in crimes and using violence as a mean for change, as well as using arbitrary, uncivilized methods which lead to more corruption.

8. Absence of trust from local & foreign investors with the Jordanian Investment Atmosphere.

9. Undermining transparency, institutionalization and the state of law principles.

10. Incompatibility of proposals & expectations with what really is achieved.

11. Undermining the principles of Administration & Ruling Institutions.

12. Supervisors' loss of control over their employees as a result of loosing their moral authority due to corruption at higher

levels.

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13. Deficiency of equal opportunities between citizens and/or receiving services.

14. Deficiency of equal opportunity in producing goods & services as well as delivering and obtaining it.

15. Implementation of difficult un-coordinated and unjustified reforms.

16. Corruption leads to the increase of cost during goods & services purchase.

17. Government's failure to attract civil society & private sector to reform process.

18. Loss of trust between government & people.

Transparency and the Availability of Information & Media Domain:

- Transparency as a concept means the availability and ability to freely access to information supported by law. It is certainly a major tool in setting up a national system of integrity and in the success of combating corruption & favoritism.

- Media occupies main post in providing the maximum limit of transparency and allowing individuals and society to access information, understand procedures and ensure its safety, justice and integrity. It is also responsible for revealing the practices of law violations and public money wastes and has its role in disposing and combating corruption and favoritism.

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Accordingly, activating the principle of transparency and the role of media in disposing corruption and favoritism requires the following:

1. Developing and amending legislations and systems to enhance transparency to publish information and facilitate access to it as well as understand procedures to achieve openness and transparency that form a preventive measure for favoritism and corruption.

2. Publish full details of information concerning important cases to society and which constitutes a public aspect of corruption and favoritism

3. Strengthening transparency as a factor would not be integrated unless it is adopted and publicized to become one of the national integrity system rules.

4. Amending laws pertaining to the freedom of media and press.

5. Assuring the principle of press and media independence.

6. The influence and interference practiced by governments and official systems is not any more the only factor to affect the independence of media and the freedom of its personnel, where as the influence of private sector enterprises and powers are becoming more obvious through using advertisement and monopoly ownership of media.

7. Reconsidering legal restraints which prohibit publishing on going corrupt-related cases in order to achieve trans-parency and openness and not to conflict with law.

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8. Assuring the principle of denouncing character assassination.

9. Establishing a national center for transparency.

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Finance & Administration Domain:

- Corruption leads to bad distribution of government services as well as deformation of economy through misallocation and waste of resources.

- increases the burden of the country's foreign debit.

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1. Governments' preparing of flexible organizational charts that interact with variables and clear to simplify procedures.

2. Government's preparing a system for administrative organization & job description that determine terms, practical & educational qualifications for job vacancies.

Proposals to handle types of administrative & financial corruption:

3. Enhancing internal auditing systems and establishing internal audit units.

4. Introducing Training programs for government officials to the principles of good government.

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5. Preparing a moral convention that complies with the local environment to include moral criteria and standard indication.

6. Establishing mechanisms for both auditing and accountability.

7. Developing preventive strategies to limit work hindrances.

8. Establishing an office of governmental ethics affiliated to each department.

8. Adopting strategies mechanisms, methodologies and that combat favoritism, discrimination and coteries.

8. Enhancing the concepts of transparency, accountability institutionalization and participation in decision taking.

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Criteria of Administrative Performrance Monitoring Domain:

Administrative Monitoring:

- Administration monitoring is the organized effort to define performance criteria for work-planned objectives, designing information feedback, compare actual performance with those pre-defined criteria, in order to determine if there are any deviations, and taking all necessary actions to assure that all inputs and processes are used with the highest and the most effective ways to achieve goals.

- Providing accountability factor is vital to achieve good governance, given the fact that it makes the state concentrate on results, focus on obvious goals, develop effective strategies and set up accurate performance reports.

- Without the availability of information, both private and public sectors would not become transparent or become subject to accountability from any party.

- Institutionalized Administrative Monitoring are group of activities performed by directors in order to assure that the processes and actual result comply and harmonized with specified plans and criteria.

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Criteria of Monitoring Administrative performance:

1. Quantitative Criteria.

2. Qualitative Criteria.

3. Criteria of Qualitative Quantity.

4. Cost Criteria.

5. Time Criteria.

6. Value for Money Criteria.

7. Economy Criteria.

8. Efficiency Criteria.

9. Effectiveness Criteria.

10. Moral Criteria.

Recommendations:

- Contain balanced group of fundamental criteria

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- Give us useful reports in suitable time and reasonable cost.

Corporations need a performance measurement plan which should include a group of criterion and indicators and which could:

- Show and give us ready information that could be used widely, understandable and could be used by the department.

- Support corporation's values and strengthen its relationship with clients and persons who are affected with the results of its transactions..

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Therefore, it is obvious that setting criteria for monitoring administrative, financial or technical performance require the presence of strategic planning which include (Mission, Vision, Strategic Objectives, Detailed Objectives, measurable Activities), and then setting up the criteria and standards.

System of Values, National Integrity, and Convention of honor Domain:

1. Protecting and immunizing individual and society against this phenomenon.

2. Eliminating causes and factors that could make individual and society vulnerable to corruption.

3. Combating all aspects of corruption and fighting corrupt people.

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System of Values and Civil Society Organizations:

Civil Society organizations should adopt in its social, economic and political programs and roles (including political parties) the tasks of deepening the values of civil society as well as values of integrity, justice and the culture of combating corruption and favoritism.

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System of Values, Culture and Education

- Religion has constituted the base in setting up the values and rules of human and moral behavior in its relationships and dealings at every aspect of social and economic life.

- Islam constitutes the fundamentals of the values and cultures of honesty, integrity, justice, equity and is considered the main weapon in combating corruption and favoritism.

- Education in the school educates and spread the value culture which enable societies and people to achieve progress, democracy, fighting tyranny and corruption, as well as enabling integrity and justice to form the base of its public life.

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Mechanism of generalizing the system of values and national integrity:

1. Preparing Islamic tutors who are capable of propagate religious awareness of the above mentioned Islamic social concepts, and deepening these concepts

2. Achieving social justice, and stabilizing citizens' rights and its immunity as well as publicizing social security in order to give the citizen safety feeling for his future and family's future and repays good to his homeland.

3. Correcting deformation in some of the above mentioned social concepts, by means of public social awareness with participation from educationalists, religious leaders, community leaders and leaders of opinion.

4. Generalizing youth awareness centers such as clubs, cultural centers and others in order to become good houses for building integral future generation.

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5. Applying transparency in all governmental practices.

6. Activating civil society organizations.

7. Public participation and government openness to civil society organizations.

8. Freedom of opinion and speech.

9. Continuous revision of plans and reform course, as well as the transparency in performance.

9. Media's following up and evaluating as well as publishing all free commentaries pertaining to the above mechanisms.

10. Behavior of authority persons, especially the leaders, should be a model for people in terms of integrity, honesty, and cleanness.

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Conclusion:

"We need a government of ministers rather than employees, a team acting in harmony with no exceptions and one that embraces the principle of transparency with no limits. …The principle of absolute transparency, coupled with that of accountability and taking responsibility for performance are the basis of success”.

H.M. King Abdullah, in his letter of designation the New Prime Minster H.E. Faisal Al-Fayez, October 2003

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