Uganda: Putting Corruption in Perspective

opinion

Kampala — Two weeks ago, I said on the NTV News Night show that the existence of corruption in a country does not automatically impede its ability to develop, thereby letting loose the dogs of intellectual (actually mostly emotional) war on twitter, with some accusing me of endorsing corruption. Yet many successful countries had high levels of corruption during their transition from poverty to riches.

In 1996, the most successful nation, South Korea, arrested two of its former presidents - Chun Doo-hwan and Roh Tai-woo. Both admitted to having stolen more than $650m (about Shs2.3b) each while in office and offered to refund part of the money. Why did South Korea develop in spite of the leaders being thieves?

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