Zanikoeva: combating corruption in Kabardino-Balkaria does not affect top officials

There is a problem with the execution of anticorruption legislation in Kabardino-Balkaria. On 18 May, this was discussed by the roundtable participants with the public engagement in the Parliament of Kabardino-Balkaria. As it was stressed by the deputy chairman of the Republic's Supreme Court Leila Zanikoeva, combating corruption affects only the lower- and middle-level officials, and does not reach the top ones.

"Analysis of the criminal cases since 2006 showed that the civil servants of grass-roots units are tried for corruption crimes with the bribes varying from 2.000 to 30.000 rubles", Leila Zanikoeva said.

According to her, no official of the Republican level has been brought to justice. The root of evil Zanikoeva sees in the society's tolerance for corruption, because it enables citizens to solve personal problems in circumvention of laws.

At the roundtable, there were announced the results of surveys of corruption carried out by a team of experts for Modern society development problems research of the Kabardino-Balkaria Institute of Humanitarian Studies (KBIHS).

The team leader Ruben Oshroev told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that 550 persons representing all segments of the population were interviewed in survey, with taking into account their gender, age, ethnicity and residency area.

According to the survey data, 17% of residents of the KBR have confessed in bribing officials. About 51.6 % of respondents believe that corruption is a very serious problem. 45% respondents believe that in Republic there are corrupted officials who abuse their office.

One of the main reasons, in respondents' opinion, is lack of real concernment of authorities in combating such phenomenon. This view is shared by 30% of respondents. However, this figure declined, as compared to the previous survey conducted in 2008. Only 40% of respondents shared this view then. When asked, "What part of the Republic-level officials are corrupted?", 30% answered "majority" and 6% answered "all".

Health care (40%), State road safety inspectorate/GIBDD (33%), militia, customs, courts and prosecutors (31%) are indicated the most corrupted.

Meanwhile, according to the head of the economic security of the Presidential Administration KBR Yuri Shevchenko, a statistical analysis of corruption-related crimes in 2009 shows a somewhat different ratio. Of the total of prosecutions for corruption crimes,  55,4% were committed by municipal employees, 18,7% - by civil servants, 10.9% - by the Kabardino-Balkaria officers, and 15% - by others.

"These facts suggest that so far the law enforcement agencies combat corruption among lower-and middle-level officials, eliminating those conditions that make corruption possible, although some positive changes were shown in the last two years", Shevchenko said.
 
As compared to previous surveys, twice as many people are willing to inform someone about the facts of corruption (61%), preferring the President of the Kabardino-Balkaria and Anti-corruption line. At the same time, about 70% of respondents are ready to give a bribe for solving various problems.

The survey also showed that the proportion of young respondents who admit themselves as being able to give a bribe to an official, almost twice exceeds that of adults'. Moreover, young people are much more pessimistic about implementation of the National Anticorruption Plan meant for reduction in the level of corruption in the Republic.