Corrupt local administrative officials

Last week in Bangkok Post a study funded by the National Anti-Corruption Commission was reported, which listed the police as the most corrupt state agency. But related to the topic of this blog, also some of the local administration units show among those agencies most often encountered in corrupt practices. The study was made public at the Conference on Evidence-Based Anti-Corruption Policy, which took place June 5 and 6. Sadly that website does not have the specific paper or at least the abstract available online.

The top five state agencies and officers that businessmen had to pay "extra money" to during the past five months of this year were the Land Department (72.22%), followed by tambon administration organisations (68.52%), provincial administration organisations (60.52%), highways and traffic police (59.08%), and local politicians and influential figures (44.76%).

State agencies where most respondents said they experienced graft include the Customs Department (12.2%) followed by tambon administration organisations (7.8%), and the Land Department (4.8%).

Interestingly only TAO and PAO (bolded by me in the citation above) show high in this list, while the municipalities as further local administration bodies aren't listed. Also, none of the central administrative bodies are on the list either, but that may simply be due to the fact that these don't have as much budget and influence anymore due to the decentralization.

BTW: After writing this posting, I now noticed BangkokPundit was little faster and posted on the same issue already.