Oil companies are paying billions towards development in the Niger Delta, but it’s having little impact on the ground, say Tijah Bolton-Akpan and Miles Litvinoff.
by TISrilanka (TISL) for Transparency International
Originally posted at: https://www.transparency.org/en/blog/turning-the-tide-on-sri-lankan-corruption#
By challenging favouritism in Sri Lanka’s land department, a resident is undermining public officials’ corruption that damages many people’s lives
Le Ministre en charge du foncier du Cameroun adopte le LANDex comme un outil devant servir à l’établissement de la situation de référence en matière foncière
During the recent Conference on Land Policy in Africa, we had a chance to sit down and speak with Professor Howard Stein of the University of Michigan. Scroll below to read more.
1) Can you tell us a little bit about your research, work and background?
Cosmas Milton Ochieng, an expert in natural resource governance and economic development in Africa, is the Director of the African Natural Resource Centre at the African Development Bank.
In collaboration with the African Union Commission and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, the African Development Bank will host the 3rd Edition of the Conference on Land Policy in Africa in Abidjan from 25 to 29 November 2019.
In this interview, Ochieng shares key insights into why the conference matters for Africa.
The land sector is increasingly being cited as a corruption hub. Many countries across the globe are grappling with land-related corruption that dates to the colonial years and which have metamorphosed into historical injustices and continue to be a source of conflict and violation of basic human rights. Cases of land grabbing, compensation-less expropriation, gender-based discrimination in accessing and ownership of land and related resources, illegal mining deals, bribing to access land administration services among others are not new in the lands sector.
I bring you warm greetings from H.E. Mousa Faki Mahamat, the Chairperson of African Union Commission. It is my honour and pleasure to deliver this statement at the opening of the Conference on Land Policy in Africa. I salute the African Development Bank (AfDB), the Government of Côte D’Ivoire and all partners for hosting and successfully organizing the 2019 Conference on Land Policy in Africa.
Our online discussion “Open Land Data in the Fight Against Corruption” is well underway with many interesting contributions so far. We are discussing whether Open Data can be a key tool to increase transparency, support innovation and increase civic engagement, in the fight against corruption. One of the key questions which reverberates throughout the open data debate in the land sector, however, is how much transparency is too much?
Increasingly, governments and citizens in developing countries as well as development agencies are using information technology to improve governance, shape government-citizen relations, and reduce corruption. Despite this, we continue to be at the first phases of understanding how to best use these new data sources in anti-corruption work, as well as appreciating the challenges and limitations inherent in them.