GOST razgledi.net

Yrjö Lautela
novinar in publicist
yrjo.lautela@suomi24.fi

Finland has a good international reputation of being one of the least corrupted countries in the world. At the grass-roots level this reputation obviously is not groundless. For example, it is unknown in Finland that someone would pay a public sector doctor or hospital official to advance his or her access to care. The Finnish police, court system and army are also estimated to be quite corruption-free. Altogether, less than ten cases of bribery crimes are convicted yearly in Finland.

The best-known international comparisons are based on two indexes, the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) and Global Corruption Barometer (GCB), both made by Transparency International. In the CPI Finland has been estimated to be the least-corrupted country at almost every year of this decade. The CPI counts only one sector of corruption, the bribability of public sector, which of course is a central field. The Finnish public administration is very transparent, which limits the chances to misconduct. Today, the CPI covers about 180 countries.

The GCB is based on interviews in different countries. The latest barometer covered 60 countries, and over a thousand persons pro country were interviewed. From the Finns 2% told that they had paid bribes. This was clearly under the EU average 5% and of course under the all-over average 13%. Still it was more than the 1% of Sweden, Austria and Switzerland, for example.

All Finns, however do not think that the good Finnish reputation is entirely deserved. It is pointed out that the word corruption is not officially used in Finland. We speak upon bribery or deceit, not upon corruption, and even this may have improved the Finnish image.

The political parties, business life and media are sectors which are less credible than others in the eyes of Finnish public. This year the financing of election campaigns and the possible corruptive links included have been under scrutiny in media. In Finland votes are given to individual candidates and not only to a party list, which increases the need of campaigning money. Even the Council of Europe Group of States against Corruption has criticized Finland upon the lack of transparency in election financing. Probably the campaigning is however cleaner than it was some decades ago, when foreign organizations, mainly KGB and CIA played their part in Finnish politics.

The so-called “good brother” - corruption has often been discussed in Finland. This means a habit of deciding important affairs in a small group of persons before the official decision process is concluded - itself legally and without juridical misconduct. This is of course legal, but the moral may be questionable and persons, companies or organizations may exploit their positions unfairly. This is probably typical in small countries where the public and private sector decision makers know each other well in most cases. Especially in communal affairs this pattern of decision-making may be widespread.

Arms trade is a business sector which is often criticized of corrupt methods. Finland has been active in arms trade for decades, although the volumes have not been extensive, especially if we compare Finland with its neighbor Sweden.

In the eighties Finland helped to build arms factories or sold know-how and licenses even to some “questionable” countries like Indonesia, Israel and Libya. Finnish explosives and grenades were transported through Western European dealers to both parts of the bloody Iran-Iraq war. Finns used Yugoslav military areas for test shooting together with Iraq customers. Iraq air force personnel were trained in Finland.

Finland had also with Soviet Union some cooperation which was linked to financing the Soviet arms deals. This helped the Finnish state-owned oil company to launch its international oil trading. For example Libya paid its arms purchases from Soviet Union with oil, which the Finns sold to world market in London.

After the cold war Finland had less chances for these kind of deals, and ten years ago a Swedish peace organization ranked the Finnish arms trade to be the most transparent in the European Union.

On the other hand the concentration of the Finnish arms building and planning resources in the nineties helped to develop a more competitive arms industry. The Patria-concern is the result of this concentration.

The history of Patria is not free from alleged corruption affairs. In 1999 Patria sold seven 155 mm field guns to Egypt. The idea was to start the production of the guns in Egypt under a license. In last year the adviser of Patria in this deal, a retired artillery colonel, claimed in a newspaper interview that Patria had ordered him to keep silent of all the several defects of the gun. He also stated that the local agent received a considerable “commission”, which was shared by some directors of the license company.

Patria has naturally denied all the charges. The Finnish police authorities are now investigating the claimed bribery in Egypt and also Patria´s claim that the colonel has “disclosed a business secret”. The third ongoing investigation concerning Patria is the case of alleged bribery in Slovenia to advance the selling of AMV-vehicles, which, of course is also under investigation in Slovenia. Patria refers to the statement of Slovenia´s defense minister that the process was transparent and legal.

The biggest arms export deal of Finland so far is the export of 690 AMV-vehicles to Poland. In Poland claims of serious defects of vehicles were presented, but they did not lead to a process. The Finns who had followed the developments stated that the information about alleged defects was invented by American competitors.

Patria´s reputation was also in danger seven years in South Africa, when EADS (European Aerospace Defence and Space Company) was involved in a big bribery scandal in South Africa. EADS had just bought 26,8 % of Patria´s shares. EADS could however clean itself against allegations.

Patria´s affair in Slovenia has not been very much in news in Finland. Finnish television (YLE) had a 15 minutes report from Ljubljana, which concentrated in Slovenian reactions. We are now expecting the results of police investigations.

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