Integrity Report 2020: 20 cases of corruption at federal authorities

Berlin At some point in October, the managing director for operations and finance could no longer be found on the website of the toll operator Toll Collect, an explanatory press release was also missing. The chairman of the management had only hired her two years ago and praised her “excellent reputation”. Last week, word got around that a managing director will also be relieved of his duties at the subsidiary Mobilfunkinfrastructuregesellschaft (Mig), where the former boss was a member of the supervisory board.

Toll Collect and Mig are both federal companies – under the aegis of the Federal Ministry of Transport. There it was said behind the scenes that both personnel decisions were related, that there had been “a compliance procedure”. Officially, the ministry did not want to comment on the incidents and referred to Toll Collect. There a spokesman said: “We do not comment on internal personnel matters.”

Toll Collect collects more than seven billion euros every year on behalf of the federal government from trucks on German motorways and federal highways. Since the beginning of the year, Mig has also been part of it, which is initially intended to encourage mobile phone providers to set up and operate masts in uneconomic regions with around one billion euros.

The control center is only taking shape in Naumburg, Saxony-Anhalt, with great difficulty. At Markt 10, in a monument that is also called “Kaysersches Haus”, the managing directors only reside with a few employees, but with “lavish” ideas, as it was called. This triggered just as critical inquiries as the large number of orders to third parties that had not been awarded by tenders, as is usually the case.

Top jobs of the day

Find the best jobs now and
be notified by email.

Waste, nepotism or taking advantage, positively formulated as “integrity”, is a sensitive and difficult topic within the federal government, the federal authorities and their subordinate agencies and societies. According to the Federal Ministry of the Interior, 20 new cases of corruption were prosecuted last year. This emerges from the report on “Integrity in the Federal Administration”, which is available to the Handelsblatt.

Sometimes the cases concerned an official from the Federal Motor Transport Authority who allegedly hushed up demands for fines, then the taking of advantages, business secrets were disclosed or expert assignments were given in return for “reimbursement”, as was the case with the development aid company GIZ. Soldiers are also said to have blackmailed each other and there are said to have been attempts at bribery at the BAMF asylum seekers office.

Fewer cases, but probably a high number of unreported cases

This year, for the first time, the Ministry of the Interior reported on the prevention of corruption, sponsorship services, as well as questions relating to internal auditing and the use of external persons. The Federal Audit Office recommended it in 2020 in order to have a better overview.

Compared to the previous year, the Ministry of the Interior registered five fewer cases of corruption. However, the report does not cover all of the data, especially when it comes to susceptibility to corruption. Three percent of the authorities did not even take part in the survey and cited confidentiality (Federal Intelligence Service and the Bundeswehr companies), referred to self-administration rights (professional associations) or their own compliance management system (Deutsche Bahn AG or the toll collector Toll Collect with its subsidiary Mig).

In the case of the highest federal authorities, only 57 percent of the endangered areas were therefore covered by the report. 15 percent of the agencies could not even name the number of areas of work that are particularly at risk of corruption, as the report shows.

Risk of corruption in investment budgets

The Federal Ministry of Transport itself manages the largest investment budget with 41 billion euros. Nevertheless, it is difficult for the House to answer questions about positions at risk of corruption and their occupation. This emerges from a response to a question from the Greens. For example, data such as the question of how often positions between 2009 and 2020 were not filled as required after five years were “not available in the majority of the authorities”.

The Federal Audit Office had already warned the ministry in a report in 2019 to “pay special attention to risk analyzes that are updated regularly and as required”. “Authorities did not monitor the length of time their employees were employed in the areas of work that were particularly at risk of corruption,” criticized the auditors.

The necessary “regular and systematic rotation” cannot take place. Rather, it should be possible to “automatically” evaluate in the electronic personnel administration system how long an employee has held a position at risk of corruption. The auditors noted that the ministry had promised “to take up the suggestions of the Federal Audit Office”.

The ministry’s answer now states that this should be possible “in the future”. The budgetary spokesman for the Greens, Sven-Christian Kindler, considers this situation to be “unacceptable”. Every fifth job in the ministry is at risk of corruption. “Solid corruption prevention would be all the more important. This includes that positions that are particularly at risk of corruption are filled every five years. This is to prevent the formation of a felt. However, Andreas Scheuer keeps the data on the length of stay of the post holders of positions particularly at risk of corruption in his business area secret or simply does not know them. “

Greens want to fight corruption more strongly

Kindler announced that a new Federal Minister of Transport would have to step up efforts to prevent corruption. “The public administration must be made immune to corruption. In the Union’s mask scandal, we saw where it can lead if corruption is taken lightly. “

The report gives at least a few examples of how the ministry is addressing the issue of corruption prevention. For example, there is a “code of conduct” at the Autobahn company, which is managing investments of more than five billion euros this year alone. Managers must report when they accept gifts.

At the German Weather Service, the commissioning and billing were “organizationally separated”. And at the Federal Motor Transport Authority, which has not only allowed vehicle types since the diesel scandal and is now also monitoring, employees would be informed by email “once a year” of the current regulations on accepting rewards and gifts “once a year” on World Anti-Corruption Day.

More: The cultural change at the Federal Motor Transport Authority is still a long time coming.

.
source site