Post-war Iraq: ‘Everybody is corrupt, from top to bottom. Including me’

February 21st, 2016

Awake Goy

One of Iraq’s anti-corruption leaders sat in his office, waving his hands in exasperation. “There is no solution,” he said. “Everybody is corrupt, from the top of society to the bottom. Everyone. Including me.”

Coming at the start of a conversation about Iraq’s ailing governance, and what was being done to turn things around, Mishan al-Jabouri’s admission was jarring. “At least I am honest about it,” he shrugged. “I was offered $5m by someone to stop investigating him. I took it, and continued prosecuting him anyway.”

Jabouri is a member of one of two anti-graft bodies, a parliamentary committee, tasked with protecting public monies in post-war Iraq. Both have more work than they can ever hope to deal with – even if they wanted to.

Now, with plunging oil prices leaving Iraq’s revenues in more jeopardy than at any time since the US invasion, attention is shifting to what the custodians of public funds have done over more than a decade with tens of billions of dollars that could otherwise be a buffer from such a budget shock.

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