Politicians main source of corruption

A study produced by Rep. Circle – The Reputation Platform in partnership with Kepler, has concluded that Portugal’s political class (69.9%) is the main driver for corruption in the country.

According to the barometer ‘Corruption and Transparency in Portugal’, which surveyed 123 top senior management figures running the main companies operating in Portugal, sport clubs and institutions (64.2%) and municipal and public services staff (54.5%9 are also in the ‘top 3’ sources of corruption.
The perception that corruption exists in Portugal was agreed by 67.5% of those polled, and cut across both public and private sectors. However, despite this perception, 65% said they didn’t know of any concrete cases of corruption in their own companies/institutions.
Some 87% of senior management think that the legal mechanisms available to prove cases of corruption are not sufficient, believing it to be important to include access to private phone taps and access to vital documents.
In the study which aims to ascertain the impact of corruption on Portuguese companies and the perception that Portuguese managers have regarding the allocation, execution and spending of funds from the Recovery and Resilience Plan (RRP), 59.4% of those surveyed said that their companies had a public commitment to fight corruption, 56.9% said they had a person responsible for compliance, and 73.2% said there was a code of ethics and conduct. Nevertheless, 45.5% did not say how their companies dealt with identified cases.
Regarding Portuguese companies, 78.86% of those canvassed thought that traffic of influence was very prevalent in national companies. They also thought that being transparent can benefit companies’s reputations, a sense of trust, and bring competitive advantages.
Among the main consequences of corruption for Portugal’s economy, senior mangers pointed to the influence of lobbies (79.7%), followed by loss of competitiveness (56.9%) and unfair competitive advantage (46.3%. The inefficiency and slowness of Public Administration (36.6%) and poor application of community funds (29.3%) were also called out.