Anti-Corruption Through International Cooperation: Preventing And Combating Corruption In Africa

Since corruption has become one of the most prominent topics of the internationallaw. Thus, in recent time, more than sixty nations have committed themselves to combatcorruption as a form of political commitments and other business practices.The last ten years the international community pledged to increase multilateraland bilateral cooperation addressing the issue of corruption. These groups include severalbodies within the United Nations, the European Union, African Union, among others. Inaddition, several non-governmental organizations, such as transparency international andthe international chamber of commerce has also engaged in the fighting againstcorruption.Corruption becomes a matter of concern in international law. Reasons may differfrom a) corruption as result of globalization thus considered a universal problem; b)corruption as a result of principles and morality around the world; c) and the internationalefforts to combat corruption is probably connected to the development of human rights,poverty eradication, maintenance of high standards of conduct for government officialand transparent financial and trade competition.In Africa political actors have abused their entrusted powers to focus on the gainsfor the few at the great cost for many. Many authors on the matter has pointed out that thepoverty, civil war, weak judicial institutions in Africa are all related cause of Corruption.Despite the vast research on the matter, this paper entitled “Anti-Corruptionthrough international cooperation: Preventing and combating corruption in Africa”. Theobjective of this research was to examine two questions: first,‘what are the main factorsof corruption in Africa?’ next ‘What should be the common interests and concerns ofinternational community and Africa governors to prevent and combat corruption?’ Toexamine these questions, this research paper conducted a questionnaire survey in threeuniversities in which two are located in China, Fudan and Jilin University, and InstitutoSuperior de Ciencias Juridicas e Sociais located in Praia-Cape Verde. The results yieldthat International community is taking measure through judicial cooperation betweenjudicial authorities in many subjects of law in different cross-border conditions. And this judicial cooperation is made through means of international treaties, conventions andmore. For instance, organizations such as UN, EU, AU, OECD, OAS, ECOWAS, PALOP,and more is join efforts to bring a global partnership to provide cooperation in the mattersof extradition or mutual cooperation among states in the matters of criminal law.This paper also argues that the main factor of Corruption in Africa is lack oftransparency and integrity; weakness of the legislature and judiciary institutions toenforce the law fairly and political patronage and also a heritage from colonial era sincethat only a few group has access to the wealth of the country and a system that arrestfrom the colonization period regarding pals, family member and more. Corruption isdirectly related to the standard of living of all African countries.In sum, this paper argues that in combating corruption, Africa government andinternational community, has the common interest and concerns to change the image andbrings more welfare and tackle the suffering of the people of the continent who areseeking for the base necessity often denied by the greed politicians who have enrichthemselves at the great expenses of others.The paper recommends that, international law is necessary to combat worldwidecorruption, especially in Africa by using investigations through internationalorganizations by means of criminal law and regional players together with the Africangovernments through a multilateral and bilateral cooperation.