Pakistan drops four spots on global corruption index second year in a row

ISLAMABAD: Corruption in Pakistan is perceived to be more rampant than it was last year as the country now ranks 124 out of 180 countries, four places down from 2019's ranking, on a global corruption perceptions list prepared by Transparency International (TI), an international non-governmental organisation based in Berlin.

Pakistan slipped four spots on the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) 2020 for second year in a row

In 2019, Pakistan ranked 120th on the global corruption list and 117 in 2018.

The TI Pakistan chairperson says country's score this year lowered despite billions of rupees recoveries made by NAB and Public Accounts Committee.

The Berlin-based non-profit releases the CPI every year, ranking 180 countries and territories by their perceived levels of public sector corruption according to experts and business people.

In neighbouring countries, the corruption score of India, Iran and Nepal also worsened by one point and Malaysia's by two points. On the other hand, Afghanistan's corruption score improved by 3 and Turkey's by 1.

Pakistan’s score in CPI 2020 has lowered to 31/100 from 32/100 in 2019 and rank to 124/180 from 120/180 in 2019.

TI Pakistan Chairperson Sohail Muzaffar says Pakistan has scored less than last year on two counts: the rule of law index and varieties of democracy.

Government defends bad ranking on corruption index

Special Assistant to Prime Minister of Pakistan on Political Communication Dr Shahbaz Gill says TI has used outdated data to measure Pakistan's corruption.

He gave an example of World Bank data cited in by TI which has been published in 2017. He said this means the data for a 2017 publication must have been collected before 2017. He showed another data source from 2018.