Holy See: Pandemic highlights
need for new solutions to counter corruption
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| Officers of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraaine stand next to plastic bags filled with seized U.S.Dollar banknotes in Kiev |
The Holy See’s Permanent Representative to the Organization
for Security and Cooperation in Europe calls for the prevention of corruption
amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
By Vatican News
Noting that all current discussions occur through
the lens of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, Msgr. Janusz
Urbańczyk said, “We have already begun to notice tangible social, economic
and environmental changes in our region due to this crisis.” He also called for
greater attention for the fight against corruption.
The Permanent Representative of the Holy See to the
Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OCSE) was speaking on
Monday during the 2nd preparatory meeting of the 28th Economic and
Environmental Forum (EEF).
Innovation, transparency, digitalization
The theme of the Forum is “Promoting security,
stability and economic growth in the OSCE area by preventing and combating
corruption through innovation, increased transparency and
digitalization”. It took place on the virtual Zoom platform due to the
coronavirus crisis.
In his address, Msgr. Urbańczyk reiterated the need to keep
attention focused on good governance, never forgetting that corruption poses a
great threat to the OSCE’s shared values and that “It generates instability and
reaches into many aspects of the security, economic and human dimensions.”
He said that both from an ethical and an economic point of
view, corruption “gives the illusion of quick and easy gains, but, in reality,
it hurts everyone, undermining trust, overshadowing transparency and leads to
doubting the very reliability of the whole legal and social system.”
Pope Francis
Quoting Pope Francis, he said “Corruption degrades the
dignity of the individual and shatters all good and beautiful ideals. Society
as a whole is called to commit itself concretely to combating the cancer of
corruption in its various forms.”
Msgr. Urbańczyk underscored the duty of those in public
administration to operate with transparency and honesty, “fostering the
relationship of trust between citizens and institutions,” and noted that “the
dissolution of this trust is one of the most serious manifestations of a crisis
of democracy.”
“The common good constitutes a resource that must be
protected for the benefit of all, especially the poorest, and in the face of
its irresponsible use the State is called upon to perform an indispensable
supervisory function, duly sanctioning unlawful conduct,” he said.
The Holy See’s Permanent Representative said that “as we
face an unprecedented health crisis, the priority of governments is obviously
the protection of health and safety,” exposing potential risks and
opportunities for corruption and breaches of anti-corruption standards such as
cutting corners in procurement processes.
It is necessary, Urbańczyk concluded, to stay alert in the
fight against corrupt practices during the response process to the crisis:
“Despite being a challenge for the international community, the Covid-19
pandemic could also provide a real opportunity to seek new and innovative solutions,
also in countering corruption, that are not divisive, politicized or partial,
but that truly seek the common good and the integral human development of all.”
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