Transparency International Uganda invited our defence and security team to assess the country’s needs on anti-corruption police training. Nick Seymour and Sir Stewart Eldon, senior consultants to the defence team, visited Uganda in July. Here’s their account of the experience.

Despite President Museveni’s policy of zero tolerance to corruption, in place since 2006, Uganda has the second highest level of corruption in police in East Africa according to Transparency International’s Bribery Indexfor the region, after Liberia (86%) and closely followed by Nigeria (78%). The percentage of households that claimed to have paid a bribe to the police in Uganda was 53% in 2009 but increased substantially in 2010, with 79 out of 100 people claiming to have paid bribes to the police.

Although the same survey indicated that around 2/3 of people felt the government was not committed to the fight against corruption, the first steps towards reform could be starting to take shape. The Inspector General of the Ugandan Police Force, Lieutenant General Kale Kayihura, and Transparency International Ugandainvited a small team from Transparency International’s Defence and Security Programme(Sir Stewart Eldon and myself) to assess the Ugandan Police Force’ needs in order to help them strengthen the anti-corruption elements of their police training. And this training is not only beneficial for the officers themselves but also to the community they aim to protect, as all these efforts will only work if citizens see their police as a clean force ready to protect them when needed. Read more.

Read the full blog 'Uganda’s police is up for a new challenge: to handcuff corruption' at Space for Transparency.

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