Nairobi — Is the World Bank about to downgrade the importance that it attaches to the issue of corruption in sub Saharan Africa?

The question has been raised in diplomatic and media circles following the appointment of the former Kenya World Bank country director Colin Bruce to the position of director of operations and strategy for Africa at the Bank's Washington DC headquarters.

With Western economic interests in Africa - particularly in new energy supplies - under threat from China and India who do not share the same level of concern over the issue of corruption in their dealings with African states, the suggestion is being made that Europe and the United States might downgrade their emphasis on graft.

The Financial Times newspaper last week pointed out that the UK's Department for International Development was already "praising the (Kenyan) government's record on economic growth while apparently overlooking corruption and inequities in the distribution of wealth."

But its report added that Mr Bruce's "new, pivotal role" at the World Bank "comes amid fraught discussions within the Bank and among shareholder governments about the extent to which combating corruption should be central to its strategy as a lender to the world's poorest countries."

Colin Bruce was accused of siding with President Mwai Kibaki and his Party of National Unity following the disputed December elections in an internal memo publicised by the FT.

Mr Bruce's colleagues have said that the former Kenya country director was only doing "what he felt was in the best interest of Kenya."

However the FT said that some diplomats believed that Mr Bruce's appointment to such a senior role "should ring alarm bells about the Bank's commitment to improving governance in the countries to which it lends."

Officially the World Bank policy on corruption remains the same and officials in Washington point out that the bank has numerous policies "emphasising accountability and transparency."

But whether Western governments will be still as keen to push these issues as the world's oil and gas crisis deepens and sources of new energy become ever more desperately sought after, remains open to question.

The debate on future strategy "has been spurred by the rapid increase of funding to Africa from (new) donors - notably China and the Middle East - for whom governance issues are not a priority," the FT says.

The UK-based newspaper also raises the issue of increasing Western concern with the political process in Kenya and in particular the future of the coalition government.

It noted that last week's by-elections "have highlighted continuing tensions between the coalition partners and the persistence of ethnic politics."

Moreover, while accepting the regular appearances of President Mwai Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga "in public shows of harmony," the report says that "doubts about the coalition government's unity and sustainability are growing."

Of particular concern, the report says, is that the Kenyan government "shows little sign of policy-making" with "some government ministers appearing more preoccupied with sidelining or upstaging each other."

Few people either within or outside Kenya "expect the coalition government to survive until the next presidential election in 2012," the report says, "and its collapse is most likely to be precipitated by disputes over tackling the underlying causes of this year's crisis."