How do we compare with other countries? In 1995 Thailand and India were “cleaner” than us, and China and Indonesia (the lowest scorer) were more corrupt. In 2000 we got overtaken by China, but at least we scored the same as India. Thailand was still higher than us. Only Indonesia was below us. In 2005 we barely kept pace. Vietnam came into the picture, and it was less corrupt than we were. Indonesia was still lower than us. By 2010, however, all these countrieswere considered cleaner than us. That was our nadir.But look what has happened in the past four years: Aside from being higher in rank than half of the countries on the list, we are at par with Thailand (never since 1995) and India, and are better off than China, Indonesia and Vietnam. I don’t know about you, but that gives me great comfort. It feels good to be in the upper half for once. The daang matuwid has taken root.There will be gnashing of teeth among the opposition, of course. But what can one do?And of course, let us not forget that our CPI is still only 38. We still have a lot of cleaning up to do. But it is good to know that the combined efforts of government and civil society (who are monitoring and who are yelling when things go wrong) are finally gelling.
Giancarlo Angulo's Blog