The Big Destructiveness Of The Tiny Bribe
Alexandra Wrage 03.01.2010
The smallest bribes can be the most vexing. Not suitcases full
of money and transfers to offshore accounts, but the thousands
of everyday payments people make to Indian building inspectors,
Chinese customs officials and Nigerian airport functionaries,
just to get things done. They’re payments for routine government
services that a government official is legally obliged to perform
but for which he’s hoping to skim off a little extra.
Unlike more serious bribes, these very modest payouts,
formally known as “facilitating payments”, are not against the
laws of the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand or South Korea,
when made abroad. They’re illegal for Great Britain, but the
Serious Fraud Office there has taken the extraordinary public
position that they’re unlikely to give rise to a prosecution.
Why don’t governments that lead the fight against large-scale
bribery fall in line with what is already the practice of many major
companies? They don’t want to outlaw such small-scale graft in
foreign places, they say, because they don’t have the manpower to
prosecute violators. By that logic, communities with just enough
resources to handle murder and armed robbery would give a green
light to shoplifting. You’d think a government could at least go
after a few high-profile cases to set an example and a precedent.
Permitting these smaller payments has to impede the effort to
crack down on the larger ones. Companies know this.
“Facilitating” bribes are not tips. Tipping is voluntary, and
you decide to do it after a service has been rendered. You don’t
pay it at the outset to induce the waiter to bring the food, and
you can always go somewhere else to eat next time should the
service be bad.
Nor are they welfare for underpaid civil servants. If government
workers are underpaid, we should compensate them for the cost
of customs inspections or airport security by aboveboard means,
through taxation and so forth. Payment to individuals not only
slows service but also encourages entrepreneurial civil servants
to increase their income by creating more and greater obstacles.
Nor are they a mere distraction from the fight against bigger bribes.
Rather, they fuel the problem. Junior officials who look for small bribes
rise to higher positions by paying off those above them. Corruption
creates pyramids of illegal payments flowing upward. Legalizing the
base of the pyramid gives it a strong and lasting foundation.
Nor are these payments legal where they’re made. They may
not be banned by the wealthy countries mentioned above, but they
are outlawed in the countries where they’re actually a problem. Do
developed countries want to say they wouldn’t tolerate such payments
at home but don’t care if they’re made abroad? And since they’re illegal
in the countries where they’re paid, companies can’t put them on their
books. The classic cover for a bribe is to call it a “consulting fee”,
but that is a books and records violation that is illegal in any country.
(www.forbes.com. Adaptado.)
No trecho do sexto parágrafo – Rather, they fuel the problem. –
a palavra rather pode ser substituída, sem alteração de sentido,
por