Africa-Press – South-Sudan. Minister Bangasi Joseph Bakosoro on Tuesday lamented that lack of integrity and professionalism among civil servants were the main drive behind the perceived rampant corruption and mismanagement in the public sector. Bakosoro who is in charge of the national ministry of Public Service and Human Resource Development, revealed that according to 2020 report by Transparency International South Sudan was ranked 179 out of 180 countries as being the second most corrupt in the world after Somalia on the global perception index.
Corruption is said to be present across all sections of the economy in the country, with the oil sector which is the main source of government revenue reported to be fraught with the vice and lack of accountability.
International observers asserted that the practice had rendered the legal system ineffective, underfunded and subject to interference, leaving top government and military officials suspected of corrupt practices and mismanagement immune from prosecution. “Lack of integrity is failing us in South Sudan … If there was integrity in all of us, South Sudanese will not be corrupt, South Sudanese will be professionals, South Sudanese will not mismanage the administration,” Minister Bakosoro said. The minister who was addressing participants to a four-day workshop to formulate and validate Minimum Wage and other employment related policies by the Ministry of Labourin Juba, said public sector employees were expected to uphold among others, the two key values of being honest, having moral principles and professionalism at all times. “There are six values in the Ministry of Public Services…let me pick two; professionalism and integrity. We need you to be professional which is the key in your work, and if you’re not professional then you will not do the right thing in the ministry,” he stressed.
