Iraq: The World's Most Corrupt State

The upsurge in violence and the attacks by anti-U.S. resistance fighters aren’t the only problems Iraqis must grapple with. And despite the seriousness of these problems, neither the authorities nor the U.S. occupiers seem to pay any attention to them.

I am here referring to the many reports by credible international organizations about the scope of corruption in the country. According to these reports, in the years since the U.S. invasion Iraq has become the most corrupt state on Earth.

It isn’t hard to find evidence to support this claim. You don’t need to be a member of an auditing firm or an international commission on transparency to prove how widespread corruption is in Iraq. Simply put, our economy is in chaos because it is administered by thieves and gangsters.

I know who I am referring to, the people know them, the police have their names, U.S. troops are aware of them and the government has all the evidence it needs to indict them. But there is no authority that will hold them to account. The corruption forms a web in which almost everyone in power is caught.

The victims are ordinary Iraqis, since the greatest success of their rulers has been the embezzlement of public wealth. Why else is it that we have no idea how much hard currency enters the Treasury through oil sales? We are ruled by the world’s mightiest military and technological power, and yet at the oil wells and the oil export terminals, we still we don’t have meters to tell us exactly how much oil we export.

No one knows how much money we’re losing, with many of our accountants and ministries relying on antiquated methods of bookkeeping, with some even shunning electronic calculators.

A recent report made available to the government and leaked to this newspaper says that Iraqi accounting books lack transparency, and that it is rare for two audits done by the same department on the same project to arrive at the same figures. As a result, the report adds, losses of even $1 billion can go unnoticed.

Is there any sane human being who would believe this? Is there a sane human being who would believe that an oil-rich country like Iraq has no idea of the number of barrels it produces or the number it exports, with the price of a barrel of oil is over $70?