How can we fail to change practice when we have seen how corruption undermines other states that Norway has tried to help? Ukraine deserves better, writes the chronicler. Here is Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Photo: Javad Parsa, NTB
Sea view
Norway’s dirty secret is that the desire to help is accompanied by willful blindness to the consequences.
Published: 04.12.2023 11:13
This is a chronicle. Any opinions expressed in the text are the responsibility of the writer. If you would like to send an article proposal, you can read how here.
We start in Afghanistan. During the 20-year mission, Norway spent NOK 23.8 billion, according to Norad’s reports. Most were in aid. Corruption was a main reason to the fact that the regime in Kabul became so unpopular, we are to believe the many the accident reports.
Under Hamid Karzai’s rule, it became common buy public positions because they provided opportunities for corruption. I mention this because Afghanistan became Norway’s most important aid destination, at the same time that the Norwegian authorities claimed to have “zero tolerance for corruption».
Reason for concern
In practice, about a third of Norwegian aid was channeled through Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund (ARTF). The multi-donor fund was established in April 2002 to provide a unified platform to give overall direction and coordination to the flood of aid funds.
Evaluation reports showed from the outset that there was cause for concern. Norway froze NOK 280 million in aid to ARTF in the wake of a Kabul Bank corruption scandal in 2011. In line with his own guidelines Norway came up with minimum requirements to resume transfers.
ARTF trained, and Norway declined. Why? Because aid was the plank in Norway’s withdrawal plan, our “exit strategy”, from Afghanistan. When then Defense Minister Espen Barth Eide announced that Norway would leave its protectorate in the Faryab province, the plan was for the soldiers to be replaced with “long-term assistance”.
It is unclear to what extent the several hundred billion dollars in aid that the donors had to get rid of corrupted the Afghan state power to such an extent that it lost the people’s support and thus undermined the objectives of the Western powers to such an extent that we handed the Taliban victory.
After reading various evaluations from five of the countries that gave the most, I am unsure whether this is a question the donors want to find an answer to. The Norwegian evaluation from 2016 notes laconic: “Withholding money due to corruption thus became difficult.”
“Extensive corruption”
A similar problem is part of the background for the ongoing conflict in Palestine. The self-governing authorities has lost popular support through widespread corruption. According to The Economist has “billions of dollars in foreign aid stolen over the past three decades”. Aid is sold in “mansions in Jordan and to fill bank accounts in Europe”. When asked to name the main problems in Palestinian society, more Palestinians point to their own authorities’ corruption (25 percent) than Israel’s continued occupation (19 percent).
Donor Country Group for the Palestinian Territory (AHLC) was established in October 1993 following The Oslo Agreement. Only Norway has remained with the chairmanship since its establishment. It is unclear why this has become so. That was not the intention.
The AHLC shall contribute to securing the financial basis for the building of the Palestinian self-governing unit. It is responsible for coordinating international aid to the Palestinian Territory and connecting the donor country group’s work and political processes.
There is no shortage of warning lights
Naturally, the reasons for the ongoing conflict in Gaza are complex, but one conceivable reason why decades of effort have now been wasted is that Palestinians in the occupied territories have not gotten better, partly due to corruption and what seems to be routine embezzlement of aid.
No other country comes close to receiving the same amount of Norwegian aid per year. per capita as Palestine does. According to Norad Norway has transferred NOK 14.5 billion in aid to Palestine since 1993. Norad acknowledges “extensive corruption” without this having reduced transfers.
Does not lack warning lights
This brings us to Ukraine. Like Afghanistan and Palestine, the country is completely dependent on aid, and again Norway is in the thick of it. Norway have committed agreed to give Ukraine NOK 15,000 million (i.e. NOK 15 billion) every year for five years, until 2027.
Ukraine is, according to Transparency Internationals “corruption perception index”, the most corrupt country in Europe. They share space with Zambia, Angola, El Salvador and Mongolia. US authorities mean corruption is so widespread that it can threaten popular support.
The experiences from Palestine and Afghanistan also suggest that the corruption, as a result of an enormous influx of money from states that are more concerned with getting rid of the money than with the money ending up in the right place, can harm the Ukrainian democracy we seek to defend.
There is no shortage of warning lights. US Agency for International Development’s “Dekleptification Guide” reported recently that the costs of major public construction projects in Ukraine are inflated by 30 percent, including 10 percent kickbacks for government officials and their friends.
In June, Norad organized a seminar, “Aid to Ukraine – ‘business as usual’ or invitation to new thinking?” After looking at the reporting and control routines, my definite impression is that the answer is “business as usual”. Norway will give NOK 15 billion a year – whatever the cost.
Ukraine deserves better
The reason for this can be read in Aftenposten’s political editor Kjetil Alstadheim’s new book «Jonas and the War» (2023). When Norway began to earn more than expected from increased gas prices as a result of Western sanctions, demands came from Europe that Norway had to depart from the market price agreement that the EU itself had insisted on.
As Alstadheim writes, the solution was for Norway to give away some of the extra income to Ukraine: “What can create ‘balance in the accounts’ for war profiteer Norway is to give more support to war victim Ukraine.” Norway is now the number one donor country per capitaper capitaPer capita is Latin and means ‘per head’. It is most often used in the sense of per capita. Source: Great Norwegian Lexicon and number four in an absolute sense – after three great powers.
US Inspector General for Afghanistan, John Sopko, have warned about that the trends from the Afghanistan mission are again evident in Ukraine. The most important thing is that the amount of aid exceeds the country’s absorptive capacity and administrative capacity. What must be done? Sopko is clear:
“We need people on the ground. You cannot supervise from the outside. I don’t care what people tell you. It doesn’t work. Trust me. I have been doing this for almost 50 years. In addition, there must be political will to stop the transfers when the minimum requirements are not met.”
Perhaps we should ask ourselves: How can Norway claim to have corruption intolerance when we look at our own track record? How can we fail to change practice when we have seen how corruption undermines other states that Norway has tried to help? Ukraine deserves better.
2023-12-04 10:13:54
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