19 May 2009
Alicia Mandaville Discusses MCC’s Anti-Corruption Efforts
CO.NX webchat transcript, May 19
Alicia Phillips Mandaville, senior policy associate at the Millennium Challenge Corporation, answered questions in a May 19 CO.NX webchat on combating corruption and reducing poverty worldwide.
Following is the transcript:
(begin transcript)
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Bureau of International Information Programs
Webchat Transcript
CO.NX Webchat: Millennium Challenge Corporation: Anti-Corruption Elements
Guest: Alicia Phillips Mandaville
Date: May 19, 2009
Time: 9 a.m. EDT (13:00 GMT)
CO.NX Moderator (Mark): Please join Alicia Phillips Mandaville on May 19 at 1300 GMT for a discussion of MCC's fight against corruption in an effort to reduce poverty.
Feel free to submit your questions now. Once submitted, your answers will appear in red.
CO.NX Moderator (Mark): Welcome to today's webchat. The webchat will begin at 13:00 GMT. We are taking your questions now.
We are about to begin
Alicia Phillips Mandaville: Welcome! For those of you not familiar with MCC, we are a U.S. Government agency designed to work with some of the poorest countries in the world to reduce poverty through economic growth. MCC is based on the principle that aid is most effective when it reinforces good governance, economic freedom and investments in people.
The U.S. Government considers the fight against corruption a major focus of its engagement with countries who receive foreign assistance through MCC. Before a country can become eligible to receive assistance, MCC looks at their performance on 17 independent and transparent policy indicators (http://www.mcc.gov/selection/indicators/index.php). MCC then selects eligible countries for grants, or compacts.
MCC has made controlling corruption a key indicator in selecting partner countries for compact eligibility. MCC believes that the efforts of a country to control corruption in its economy and society is key to reducing poverty.
I look forward to an open dialogue about MCC‘s control of corruption indicator and our country selection process today. I will try to respond to as many questions as I can. One of MCC’s hallmarks is transparency and we want to do our best to respond to your questions and comments in the next hour. With that, let’s begin the discussion. Please visit www.mcc.gov for additional information.
Question [tolo]: what corporation? are you a government or business? who is in charge of your mcc?
Answer [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: Hi Tolo- We are a US government foreign aid agency, but were set up to run as much like a business as possible -- that is part of why the word "corporation" is in our name. We are led by a CEO who is appointed by the President and confirmed by congress, but we also have a Board of Directors which is chaired by the Secretary of State. That Board makes our most important investment decisions (like which countries we will work with, and what projects we will fund).
Comment [Thomas LE GUEN]: Let US begin! :)
Comment [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: yes lets!
Q [Unknown]: I sent my wife to Nigeria two weeks ago and she says life is becoming more and more unbearable. No fuel at gas stations, long unending queues. A country that produces oil, It's unthinkable. Too many good Nigerians have fled the country for insecurity reasons. We need a revolution. Our current president is ruling us in fear of being killed by old greedy politicians who installed him in office purposely for more lootings of our oil monies. Can we get any assistance from the U.S?
A [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: MCC is mandated by legislation to work with lower income to lower middle income countries. In addition, MCC is also mandated to make sure countries are eligible under our 17 policy indicators before they receive assistance. Currently, Nigeria is below the median on the majority of those indicators. We work with a number of surrounding African countries and we hope their examples of good governance will create a positive effect throughout the region.
Q [Jim Wesberry]: In spite of bi-lateral and multilateral programs and projects to fight corruption since the 1990's, we are losing the battleand may lose the war. What are we doing wrong and what can we change to our approach to make it more successful?
A [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: Hi Jim - I certainly don't have all the answers to what's happened over the last 20 years, but I can say a little bit about what we are trying to do now at MCC.
One of the most important pieces is recognizing that the answers to corruption have to come from inside the country itself. MCC's Threshold program works with about 10 countries on fighting corruption, but each of those programs are a little bit different.
Q [zia Hassan]: Do you think that punishments can stop the corruption in third world?
A [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: We know that changing behavior through incentives works far more effective than punishments, sanctions, or rhetoric. MCC has learned that selecting good partners who share our goals with respect to ruling justly, investing in people, and promoting economic freedom works. We know that enabling those partners to select and implement their homegrown projects, using world class standards for project success, including economic, environmental, and gender criteria works.
Comment [sanou]: hi i'm sanou from Bamako,mali
A [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: Hi Sanou -- looks like there are a lot of people from Bamako today. Nice to see you all here. You live in a lovely city!
CO.NX Moderator (Mark): Welcome to everyone just joining us. We're glad you are online with us today. Feel free to introduce yourself if you have not already done so. I am Mark, the webchat moderator here in Washington, D.C.
Comment [tolo]: thank you.
Comment [Madison]: hello i am madison from bamako
CO.NX Moderator (Mark): Welcome Madison!
Comment [Tchello KASSE]: Hello
Comment [PaPa]: HI
Comment [san9saka]: Hallo.
Comment [totok]: good morning mam, I am a student from Indonesia..
Comment [Magdy]: I am from Egypt
CO.NX Moderator (Mark): Magdy, welcome to the discussion.
Q [Issiaka]: According to you what is the corruption?
A [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: One of the most difficult things about fighting corruption is that it is such a broad, wide concept. From a practical perspective, MCC thinks about it in two ways. First, we look a how well a country has 'control of corruption' as part of our eligibility process. This means that for our Board to decide that a country is eligible for funds from MCC, the country has to score above a certain mark on the World Bank Institute's Control of Corruption indicator. (more on that later)
The second place we think about corruption is within the programs we fund directly. That's why we recently launched a new anti-corruption policy, which details how MCC works to prevent, detect, and remediate corruption. We think the best way to deal with corruption is to be realistic about the need to address it.
Q [Tchello KASSE]: Alicia, are you in wasington?
A [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: I am.
Comment [Issiaka]: Hi, I am Issiaka Diarra from Bamako
CO.NX Moderator (Mark): Issiaka, welcome!
Comment [Stranger198]: Greetings To USA
CO.NX Moderator (Mark): Ms. Phillips Mandaville continues to work on answers to your questions.
Q [Tchello KASSE]: What is the relationship between MCC and MCA?
A [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: thanks for asking this (the differnece of just one letter can confuse people). The MCC is the US agency, based in Washington DC. The MCA is the country's own office that is charged by their own government with implementing the program that we fund. So in Mali for example, the MCA-Mali office is handling the day to day management and implementation of their Compact projects.
Q [sanou]: can you talk a little bit about some kinds of corruptions you encountered in real life
A [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: How about some of the kinds of corruption that our Threshold programs are addressing (because corruption is so different from place to place)?
In Zambia, for example, a recently completed program (which we call the Threshold Program) looked at ways to reduce corruption in customs offices. This is a kind of corruption that mostly affects people moving goods across borders, but it has a big impact on economic activity and incomes.
Whereas, in Paraguay, a program there looked at ways of reducing corruption among public servants (the civil service). This is a kind of corruption that affects people in their more personal lives as they try to educate their children, register their marriages/businesses, etc.
Q [vikram s]: regulation and corruption are like Siamese twins. well meaning laws also often lead to extortion in the name of activism. do u think that perhaps the inability to evaluate, encourage and monitor genuine devleopment opportunities leads to more resource allocation inefficiencies than corruption?
A [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: This is a great and complicated question, and it makes me want to explaing how we use the Control of Corruption Indicator a bit more.
So this indicator is from the World Bank Institute's Governance matters data set: http://info.worldbank.org/governance/wgi/index.asp and it captures a wide range of individuals perceptions about levels of corruption.
Some of the data comes from surveys of business, who have been asked about their experience with petty corruption when they are trying to adhere to legal regulations.
Other data comes from anti-corruption experts who have been asked to rank a country based on how much corruption is present relative to its neighbors and other countries in its income bracket.
Finally, some of the data has roots in household surveys of peoples perception of how corrupt their government may be (at local or national levels).
What's good about this is that when we start to talk with a country about what it might want to address in an anti-corruption program, we have a broad range of information about what people perceive to be the specific issue. So in some cases, there are regulatory aspects to be addressed, but in other cases there are not.
Comment [Jim Wesberry]: Introducing myself while waiting, I am retired and living in Quito, Ecuador after many years working with anti-corruption projects.
CO.NX Moderator (Mark): Jim, welcome. I'm sorry I did not see your introduction earlier. (We have many questions coming in.)
Q [madison]: some Nigerians say that what they give to their decision makers is not a bribe but a present and they say that this is part of their tradition. do you agree with that?
Alicia Phillips Mandaville: A couple of people have asked something similar, so I wanted to address this question of "what counts as bad corruption". While I don't have a ranking or scale of which corruption is worse than others, one of the main questions we ask before we fund an anti-corruption program is whether the program is targeting the kinds of corruption that are most affecting people.
That is why we rely so much on the data that I mentioned earlier (the surveys that make up the Control of Corruption indicator).
Tchello KASSE: How much money would you spend from the beginning up today?
A [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: Since 2005, MCC has invested about $250 million in anti-corruption work. That has been work in 14 countries across Latin America, Africa, and Asia.
Q [IGORIGOR125]: My question is whats Obama's steps for further reduce poverty?
A [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: Identifying and supporting anti-corruption efforts as a tool to reduce global poverty is part of MCC's unique foreign assistance model, which is why we are so pleased to see that the Obama administration requesting a full $1.42 billion for MCC in the FY10 budget request. (this is a 63% increase from last year!) While not all of that money goes toward anti-corruption programs, this request really shows the administration supports MCCs approach to this critical issue.
Q [Tchello KASSE]: Do americans know corruption in the different states?
A [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: Yes. Nobody thinks that this is only a problem in other countries. Thats why there is so much effort to pursue more transparency in government (sunshine is the best anti-corruption disinfectant) as well as specific efforts to account for US government spending. If you listen to the way people are talking about tracking the fiscal stimulus spending, its clear that people want to make sure that money also goes where it is intended. For MCC's part, we are trying to be as transparent in our operations as possible.
If you want to know more about our spending, our programs, our economic analysis, the way we select our country partners-- most of that information is available on our web-site www.mcc.gov
Q [Kathryn 2]: How does MCC coordinate with USAID and other U.S. government agencies?
A [Alicia Phillips Mandaville]: We work very closely with our colleagues in other agencies, particularly in the Threshold Program. This is a program for countries whose performance on the eligibility indicators is close to meeting the MCC criteria for large scale development assistance. It focuses on policy areas that would help them to improve indicator performance. We work directly with USAID on these programs.
One of the best things about this collaboration is that it lets both MCC and USAID do what we each do best. MCC provides an incentive to focus as much as possible on a specific policy area in the hopes of becoming eligible for large development grants. USAID provides technical know-how and on-the-ground-expertise and management for capacity building and policy programs.
Alicia Phillips Mandaville: It has been great to talk with all of you. Its so nice to see this much interest in anti-corruption work and MCC in general. I really would encourage you to check out our website <www.mcc.gov> if you have more questions. We are somewhat proud of how much information is up there and hope that you all will put it to good use. Thanks for joining me and for all your excellent questions!
Comment [Madison]: I enjoyed it .thank you too.
Comment [Tchello KASSE]: So, see you on next time. Have a good week.
Comment [sanou]: thank you
Comment [IGORIGOR125]: Thanks to all for interesting questions...
Comment [Issiaka]: It was so nice.
CO.NX Moderator (Mark): Everyone thank you for your questions. There were many questions coming in and we hope you will understand that our speaker tried to answer as many as possible.
We wish to thank Ms. Phillips Mandaville for joining us for this webchat. The transcript will be available here in one to two days and on our Facebook page at http://co-nx.state.gov.CO.NX
This webchat is now closed. Please visit us on http://www.america.gov/multimedia/askamerica.html or on our Facebook page at http://co-nx.state.gov or e-mail us at conx@state.gov.
(end transcript)
