Tunisian anti-corruption watchdog: Corruption up ‘dramatically’

Corruption has “dramatically” increased since 2011, Anadolu Agency quoted an official in the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) in Tunis as saying on Friday.

Najat Basha, representing the NACC, said: “The commission has received around 12,500 complaints related to corruption from all over the country since 2011.”

According to Basha, the commission prioritises urgent complaints, investigates them and then submits them for adjudication by the Tunisian courts.

She said that the NACC had investigated around 3,000 complaints, noting that they only accepted complaints related to graft in the public sector due to lack of resources. However, she stressed that Tunisian law does allow for the watchdog to also probe private sector corruption.

Basha said that the scope of the complaints and the consensus of all sides in Tunisia prove that corruption is deep-rooted in all fields and administrative hierarchies amongst Tunisian ministries, including education, health and higher education.

“The commission depends on the political will to fight corruption,” Basha said, stressing that fighting corruption is “far harder that fighting terrorism if all sides do not take part in it.”

The Tunisian economy has been battered since the ouster of former despot Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in 2011 and several terror attacks have caused Tunisia’s vital tourism sector to falter. One of the most notable attacks occurred in the resort town of Sousse in 2015, with a Daesh gunman killing 38 people, mostly British tourists.