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Malaysia unfazed by corruption index ranking

KUALA LUMPUR: Allegations of corruption in Malaysia are made by Westerners who fail to obtain contracts, and will not affect the investment climate in the country, Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said.

He was responding to a ranking of corruption in countries issued by watchdog group Transparency International, which placed Malaysia at 23 out of a total of 40.

"When they come here they want contracts, when they fail they offer bribes but when they secure the contract they keep quiet although they had offered bribes," the national Bernama news agency quoted Mahathir as saying late on Friday.

He added that if investors from the West did not want to come to Malaysia because of the perception of corruption, Japanese investors would take up that opportunity.

Mahathir, an outspoken critic of the West, also said that Europe itself was not free of corruption.

"If we have our own observer unit and study their (European countries') position, they are actually involved in corruption," he said.

Transparency International is a Berlin-based watchdog group partly funded by Britain and the United States as well as large American corporations.

It released its first international corruption index on Thursday. The survey excluded the former Soviet Union and African nations.

New Zealand was listed as the "least corrupt" nation, scoring 9.55 out of a perfect 10 while Singapore was second at 9.26. At the bottom of the list were Thailand at 2.79, the Philippines at 2.77 and Indonesia at 1.94.

The United States was ranked at 7.79, behind the United Kingdom's 8.57 and Germany at 8.14.

News of the survey's results prompted Malaysia's Parliamentary Opposition Leader Lim Kit Siang to urge Malaysia to toughen corruption laws.

In a statement released on Saturday, Lim, who is Secretary-General of the Democratic Action Party, Malaysia's main opposition party, said, "Malaysia cannot claim to be corruption-free."

"Instead of dismissing the TI report, the government and nation should use its report for a new lease of attack on corruption in Malaysia," Lim said. "This must be done not for the sake of TI, but for the sake of Malaysia."-REUTER