Europe, Headlines

KOSOVO: No Freedom from Corruption

Apostolis Fotiadis

PRISTINA, May 5 2008 (IPS) - The new government in Kosovo has failed so far to live up to its promise of fighting corruption.

The Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK), leading member of the ruling coalition, ran a pre-election campaign on anti-corruption rhetoric that projected now Prime Minister Hasim Thaci as one of the last few clean politicians in Kosovo.

But the report ‘Fighting Corruption With Rhetoric’ published last week by the Pristina-based NGO ‘Democracy, Anti-Corruption and Dignity’ (COHU) says that by the beginning of April when the Thaci government completed its first 100 days (since it took office Jan. 9), the government has failed in all its promises.

The report says the government has mostly focused on replacing officials loyal to the previous government with its own, promoting privatisation without transparency, and damaging the interest of public companies.

The management boards of public companies, apart from the Public Electricity Company and the Kosovo Trust Agency (KTA) that oversees privatisations, have still not been constituted.

In the case of the Public Telecommunication Company (PTK), this has affected services for almost a million consumers, the report says. And that has opened up the space for a private telecommunications provider “through its influence on the corrupt Telecommunication Regulatory Authority” – that regulates the telecommunications market without a formal managing board.

Indications of a strong nepotistic culture have emerged. Minister for Public Health Alush Gashi approved a list of candidates selected for specialisation at the University Hospital in Pristina, ignoring the report of a commission that the selection was done in violation of the law.

“In this list you can find the daughter of Gashi’s advisor, Safa Rexhep Boja,” COHU member Blerton Ajeti told IPS. “You can also find children of various directors of departments, advisors and medical staff within the Ministry of Health and the University Hospital.”

The government’s failure to stand up to its promises comes at a time when corruption is killing the economy of Kosovo. Transparency International’s 2007 Global Corruption Barometer ranked Kosovo as the fourth most corrupt country, after Cameroon, Cambodia and Albania.

According to COHU, close to half of Kosovo’s population of two million lives around the poverty limit, and another 18 percent live in extreme poverty. Unemployment is at least 46 percent, and the balance of trade is severely negative. According to government statistics, exports and imports for February 2008 amounted respectively to 14.1 million euro and 127.5 million euro.

The people seem not to want to fight corruption either. “There is a very strong survivalist culture in Kosovo that creates a social solidarity of not exposing issues, and accepting corruption and the informal market,” a French United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) customs officer stationed in the region for more than five years told IPS on condition of anonymity.

“Corruption has been institutionalised by failing to tame organised crime associated with veterans of the Kosovo Liberation Army who dominate local politics, and by the involvement of international personnel,” the customs official said.

“The best example is Steven Schook (former deputy head of UNMIK), who flew away in the middle of the night while he was under investigation. He was involved in overpricing the construction of the Kosovo C electricity plant,” the official said.

Schook, a retired U.S. army general, left Kosovo suddenly last December while he was undergoing internal investigation. He left after being informed that his contract with UNMIK would not be renewed in 2008, meaning he would lose the diplomatic immunity granted to UNMIK staff.

The Kosovo C project, the biggest and most expensive since the international community arrived in 1999, is still pending though it could become a valuable source of income for the region. The project opens up access to Kosovo’s lignite reserves, the richest in Europe.