This Giant Beast That is the Global Economy (2019) s01e08 Episode Script
A Global Corruption Tour
1
Today's episode
explores corruption.
Call me cynical,
but I feel like we're living
in very corrupt times.
Everywhere you look,
people in lofty
positions are using
those positions
to enrich themselves.
Sometimes, the powerful steer
important government contracts
to their cronies.
Sometimes, they charge bribes
for essential services.
And sometimes, they preside
over the gross misuse of funds
intended, sorry, can we just
cut for a second, please?
Do we really not have the budget
for a nicer backdrop or like
a location or something?
What about the plant?
What about the plant?
It's a very expensive plant.
Ow, what are you?
No, shiny, like this one.
Okay, sorry, my bad.
I, I'm being an asshole.
Sorry, sorry, everybody.
Don't worry about it.
My mouth, no, not a twenty.
Mm, yeah, there we go.
Aight, from the top,
what's his name?
Kal, baby.
This is corruption.
Whether you like it or not,
we're all connected by money.
I'm Kal Penn, exploring
this giant beast
that is the global economy.
There is a lot of
corruption in the world.
Across the globe, corruption costs
an estimated $2.6
trillion each year,
skimming 5% off the planet's GDP.
And according to the World Bank,
corruption is one
of the main reasons
the rich get richer, while
the poor stay poor.
Part of what makes
fighting corruption hard
is that it isn't just one
thing, like bribery.
It's a whole party platter
of slimy activities,
from selling Senate seats,
to taking joyrides on
taxpayer-funded planes.
But how does corruption
affect the economy?
To find out, I'm going
back to school,
to talk to a guy who
has spent years
studying that very question
Former US Secretary of
Labour, Robert Reich.
Thank you so much for doing this.
I have been a fan of
yours for a while.
Any chance that when
the show comes out
you can, you can mention it
to your 2.5 million
Facebook followers?
Well, we'll see.
I would like to help,
sure, in any way I can.
Okay, well, what if I
gave you an origami box?
It's beautiful,
absolutely beautiful.
Look, and there's even
something inside.
Oh, well yeah, that is money.
Now will you mention us?
No, no.
Damn.
Robert Reich apparently
is a man of integrity.
That's a refreshing
quality in a guy
who has spent a lot of
time in the White House,
three White Houses actually.
He worked as Labour
Secretary under Clinton,
for Carter before that,
and for Ford before that.
Now, Reich focuses on how
corruption on Wall Street
and in political lobbying
is hurting America.
He even made a movie about it.
How would you define corruption?
Corruption is the
payment for things
that are deemed
illegitimate by society,
that should not, according
to most people,
be bought or sold.
The guide is, would most people
feel that this is wrong?
If it's a payment that you
and I are involved in,
and I say, I don't
know, let's, you know,
you know, let's talk
about it like this
And by the way,
my hand is under the table,
and don't tell anybody else,
it's obvious we're getting
away with something
that is, if not against the law,
certainly against the
spirit of the law.
Okay, I would love
if you could talk me
through some of the more egregious
examples of corruption,
but then, also maybe,
some of the everyday ones
that we don't even think of
as being corrupt practises.
One example is kickbacks.
Suppose you are a doctor
and the drug company
is giving you a
little tip based upon
how much you prescribe my drug.
That's not good for the
person who is your patient.
Your obligation should
be to the patient,
not to the drug company.
So, if that is
definitely corruption,
then is our political
system corrupt?
And I'm thinking of
industries paying lobbyists
or making donations directly
to candidates themselves,
those candidates
then propose bills
or vote in the interest of these
companies, is that corruption?
That's a quid pro quo,
that's corruption.
A lot of Americans look
at that and they say,
hey, the game is rigged
in favour of the people
with a lot of money and big
corporations and Wall Street.
And are there smaller
forms of that?
- Are there things that
- Yes.
Petty bribery sends a signal
to an entire populace
that it's okay to be on the take,
it's okay to pilfer, it's okay
to take from the employer.
All of that is bad.
I mean, economic terms,
corruption is a huge negative.
The countries that
are most corrupt
are growing the slowest and
having the hardest time
getting out of poverty.
Once you open the
door to corruption,
everything flies through it.
The door gets wider
and wider and wider,
and the economy has a
very hard time growing.
You could fill a whole library
with the different ways
corruption creeps in
and stunts economies.
But sometimes, it starts small.
In India, low-level corruption,
known as petty corruption,
is rampant in the form of bribery.
According to an Ernst
& Young survey
of international business leaders,
83% said that bribery
is a deterrent
to foreign investment
in the country.
I'm meeting with a group of
middle-class professionals
in Pune to find out what living
with widespread low-level
corruption is like.
I understand how corruption works.
I've worked in India before,
so, I've had a taste of it.
As a kid, I remember coming in,
and there would be a long
line to go through customs,
and it was basically
It was a shakedown.
My mum is really tough
and she's like,
"I'm not paying you for this.
I'm not coming in to sell."
Like, she is a badass.
She's awesome. She's yelling back
at these corrupt customs officials
who are trying to shake
her down for money.
I am the kind of person
who is like your mother,
I'll be like, "I'm not
paying you for this nonsense
because I haven't
done anything wrong."
And if I have done
something wrong,
then I would rather
just pay the fine.
Has that actually happened?
Yes, I fought with
multiple police,
men and women
and my mother's had
to just step in,
and usually she
just pays them off.
What are you scared of? Is there
something you're scared of
- if you don't pick which one?
- Yeah.
Maybe they'll start
just abusing you,
or they'll start talking in a
rash language or something,
and I'm always in a hurry.
I've tried the excuse,
"I'm going on a, you
know, emergency."
Then they tell me,
"You are a doctor, no?
Okay, instead of 400,
just give us 200."
So, they'll ask you straight up.
Yeah, that happens.
You have a similar experience?
Yeah, I have a experience
with my family.
One of my cousins, he
met with an accident.
They're not that rich, so they
went to a public hospital,
which is government.
His leg is fractured. He
is not able to stand.
He asks the ward-boy to help him
to shift him on the second floor
because he had to
get it plastered.
He's asking for the bribe before
he'll give you the wheelchair
and then take you upstairs.
That has serious ramifications
for people's health.
Do you set money aside for that?
Like a rainy day for corruption?
Yeah, people do.
My friend's dad is a lawyer.
He's gotten people who
come to him and say,
"We wanna set up a
restaurant and we've done
"all the work that needs
to be done legally.
Now they just want us to
pay them under the table."
And, and my friend's
dad just said,
"Pay them. You know,
you could give me
"all the money you
want, and we still
wouldn't be able to fight them.
Just pay them."
I think mentally we are prepared.
Only thing is, we don't
know the exact amount
how much we'll have to pay.
So, that's why
there's no line item
in your budget for bribery, but
mentally, you are prepared
Mentally we are prepared.
And I would imagine, constantly
in a state of anxiety.
It's not hard to imagine
how small-scale
corruption like petty bribery
becomes commonplace.
But bribery is just one of
the many types of corruption
the global economy can dish out.
Here's what else is on the menu.
Corruption can take various forms,
but all of them are
connected to power.
Imagine if the person
running your cafeteria
exploited her power for more
than just free tater-tots.
There'd be rampant bribery,
where people pay to
be in my good graces.
Can I have a tray?
Could I have a tway?
I don't know, can you?
Go right ahead.
Nepotism is also a common
form of corruption,
like when I hired
my brother, Derek,
whose skill set includes
being related to me.
You're supposed to
say "bless you."
It's common courtesy.
There's also self-dealing,
because why should we buy desserts
from a reliable wholesaller
when I can pay myself?
Excuse me, there's a
Band-Aid in this.
Congratulations, Derek's
just a little bit clumsy.
Oh, and I almost forgot,
extortion and blackmail.
It would be a shame if
the wrestling coach
knew that you broke your diet
to have that yummy dessert.
Go in peace.
Also, there's embezzlement,
which is basically just theft.
Derek, put that
under the mattress.
You got it, Sis.
Corruption never tasted so sweet.
Is that a toenail?
Damn it, Derek.
Corruption is easy to spot when
it's just a few bad apples
running independent shakedowns.
But how do you know
when it's a bigger problem,
one that has worked its
way into the system?
To find out, I'm back in New York
to consult New Yorker
Reporter Adam Davidson.
Since Adam's also a
producer on this show,
I don't think he'll
mind if I just pop in.
- What's up?
- What's up, man?
How would you define corruption?
Is corruption like pornography?
You know it when you see it?
Corruption, we think
about it today
as this perversion, this bad thing
that happens to otherwise
well-functioning economies.
But that idea is so new.
If you think of a feudal monarch,
where the king has absolute power
and peasants are essentially
property of the king,
that is so corrupt that the
word corruption is meaningless,
because it's, there's nothing
being corrupted, it's just
- It's just how it is.
- It's just how it is.
So, to actually think
of it as corruption,
you first need to build a
functioning middle-class economy
that can be corrupted.
I would say it's a
helpful rule of thumb
to establish, is a country
fundamentally corrupt
as opposed to just
sometimes corrupt,
is to ask the president
or prime minister,
who's the biggest person in
concrete in this country?
And if that person knows
or, even more likely,
if that person is in active
business with that person,
that is a sign it's an
extremely corrupt country.
That's so interesting, okay.
Concrete is, in many ways,
the perfect substance
through which to look at
this issue of corruption,
both how it works and also,
how it hurts people.
Hold on, let me do some
creative visualisation.
Sure.
Yeah.
- Okay, go ahead.
- So
- Hell yeah.
- Anything made of concrete
has three components, what
they call aggregates,
sand and little stones
Cement, and water.
The cement, in a properly-built
concrete structure,
is about 15% of the
overall material,
but it's the vast
majority of the cost.
So, there's a huge incentive
to not use as much cement
and build a building.
It'll stay up, but it'll
eventually fall down.
When you hear on the news,
250,000 people died
in an earthquake, it is not
an earthquake disaster,
- it's a concrete disaster.
- Wow.
In 2010, a magnitude 7.0
earthquake hit Haiti,
causing $8.5 billion in damage
and killing over 200,000 people.
Many survivors pointed
to poorly-made concrete
as the reason the
destruction was so bad.
Bad concrete also had deadly
consequences in Turkey in 1999,
in Sichuan in 2008, and
in Mexico in 2017.
In some of these cases, the
same contractors who profited
from putting up bad concrete
benefited from the rebuilding.
In Haiti, many of the
construction contracts
went to a relative of the
Prime Minister's wife,
which raised a lot of questions.
What we see in
corrupt countries is
the basic material of life,
things like concrete,
potable water, electricity,
telephone lines, boring stuff,
become sources of enormous
wealth for the elite.
That's, that's, prevents a
society from developing.
That prevents an economy from
growing in a healthy way.
Oh, and just in case you
think it couldn't happen
in America, in 2006, six
contractors were arrested
for their role in
Boston's Big Dig.
It was the most expensive
highway project in history,
costing $243 billion
and 15 years of traffic jams,
not counting the damages paid
for the leaks, the flaws,
and one death.
Corruption is also a draw away
from legitimate enterprise.
It's a terrible force
that really strikes
at the very heart of what
makes the modern world good.
I'm starting to understand
how serious the consequences
of corruption can be.
Now, I wanna see
this beast up close.
Perhaps somewhere, I can
experience first-hand
a wide range of corrupt businesses
or maybe even see the
pristine habitats
of cronies in the wild.
Conveniently, those
are the exact things
offered by what might be Prague's
oddest tourist attraction,
the Corrupt Tour.
Alright.
So, this is the Corrupt Tour.
Actually, what we
show here in Prague
is the best of the worst.
Petr Sourek was inspired
to start the Corrupt Tour in 2012.
Since then, the Czech
Republic's Parliament
has never stopped serving up
heaping portions of
graft and sleaze
for him to work with.
Like in 2013, when
the Prime Minister,
who ran on an
anti-corruption platform,
resigned amidst a bribery scandal.
As a corrupt tour,
we like corruption.
We like that they do dodgy deals,
and that they do it
openly, in the public.
So, that gives you
more to work with.
Yeah, of course.
Prague is a city that never stops
giving Petr material,
like Blanka Tunnel,
a giant over-budget
construction pit,
basically, Eastern Europe's
version of the Big Dig,
and Motol Public Hospital,
where doctors were accused
of giving preferential care
to VIP patients.
Actually, the tour doesn't
go there any more
because administrators told
Petr he could only come around
if he paid them.
So, what do you love
about what you do?
What do you, what do you love
most about giving these tours?
Typically, corruption
feeds on business.
Now we're a business that
feeds on corruption.
- That's cool.
- In a legal way.
- I hear you.
- Okay, okay?
Petr's Corrupt Tour is a
light-hearted slap back
at the power players who have
ripped off the Czech people.
Snacks are included.
And now you can bite it.
- For the photo.
- I can bite it?
Are there nuts in it? Okay.
There's even a graduation
ceremony at the end.
I just handed over money for
this MFA in Corruption,
which seems about right.
For a deeper understanding,
I need to learn from someone
with a more serious
approach to the topic.
Hi, I'm here to see
David Ondracka.
- Please, come upstairs.
- Thank you.
Transparency International
is the world's leading
anti-corruption organisation,
with 100 offices around the globe,
and David Ondracka is part
of its crack corruption-fighting
team of experts.
Even though David's dead serious
about fighting corruption,
like everyone else
I've met in Prague,
he also has a little
weird fun with it,
like this educational
corruption board game.
The aim of the game
is really to get rich
and to get as many
politicians as you can.
So you're using money
to buy their influence.
I think a lot of people
who are watching
are gonna say, well,
we're just screwed.
- No.
- There's no way
that I could ever make a
difference in anything.
- No.
- And clearly, you don't
believe that, otherwise, you
wouldn't be working here.
Being an anti-corruption activist
is not a simple thing to do.
We are facing very
strong opponents
financially and power-wise.
But, we still can actually
make a difference.
But in many parts of
the world, it's a very
dangerous exercise, right.
And you're risking your life.
I'm a political person so
I like to play this role,
and it's something which
still keeps me excited.
One of the strategies
Transparency International
uses to stop corruption is its
Corruption Perception Index,
which surveys international
business people
and then ranks 180
countries around the world
on their reputation
for trustworthiness,
with number one being the best
and number 180 being the worst.
So, what's the cost of corruption
and why should people care?
Well, the simple answer
is money, of course.
The public money that
should be targeted on
specific public services
are being used to
someone's pocket,
that's very simple.
If you dig deeper,
you will find out
some unbelievable stories
and unbelievable processes.
Government deals are being
manipulated at an enormous level.
At the end of the day, it's the
highest form of corruption.
Well, that's all well and
good, but it's not funny.
How do we make it funny?
There's nothing funny
about corruption,
especially at high
levels of government.
That is grand corruption.
The ruler of my nation
keeps an iron grip
on his power and
wealth, and he demands
to be treated like a god.
Plus, he spies on everyone.
So, his inner circle continues
to get fat and rich,
while the rest of us
just toil in factories.
He even gave himself
a ridiculous title,
Santa Claus.
See, it all started when
dear Santa seized control
of a vital resource,
Christmas gifts.
Now, people have to bribe
him with milk and cookies.
Meanwhile, those of us who
actually make the gifts,
well, we're so malnourished
that we don't even
grow to full-size.
I mean, there's no
incentive for hard work
or innovation because Claus
Man will just take credit.
I mean, you don't even realise
how much control he
has over people.
Like parents, parents will
buy a gift for their kids,
with their own money,
and still say that
Santa brought it.
Dumb fucking sheep.
Wanna know another symptom
of grand corruption?
How about changing the rules
to only reward people who are nice
in the eyes of dear Santa, and
then punishing everyone else
with this crap.
Son of a bitch keeps lists.
People wait in line for hours,
just for the privilege
to beg at his feet.
Guy doesn't do shit.
He works, what, one day a year?
Ho, ho, ho, hey,
come sit on my lap.
Alright, jolly son of a bitch.
- He's in here.
- Oh, shit, North police.
Tell my story.
Don't you put me on a shelf.
One country that has
had its economy rocked
by grand corruption is number 62
in Transparency
International's ratings,
Malaysia.
Malaysia recently had the
biggest corruption scandal
in its history.
Prime Minister, you look happy.
Can I ask you, sir, why
you haven't resigned
over personal involvement
in the corruption scandal
of global proportions, sir?
Well, I think the big
headline grabber
was the revelation that
the Prime Minister
had taken one $700 million payment
into his own bank account
on one transaction.
This is Clare Rewcastle Brown,
a Malaysian-born journalist
who broke the story
that Malaysia's Prime
Minister Najib Razak
was taking money from a
state-owned investment fund
called 1MDB.
There was a lot of positive
publicity over it,
how he was going to
raise this money
and he was going to
invest it for Malaysia
and it was going to
make Malaysia very rich
through all these
profitable investments.
1MDB raised billions of dollars
from investors all
around the world,
including Goldman Sachs and
the Saudi royal family.
But that money wasn't coming
back to the Malaysian people.
The money went into
the bank accounts
of the proxy, Jho Low,
who has now got himself
an international reputation
as the playboy of the
Western world of that time.
- Girl, I wanna ♪
- Do it ♪
Jho Low was Prime Minister Najib's
money-laundering associate,
and he allegedly used 1MDB
money to finance yachts,
a Picasso, and to party
with the rich and famous,
like Paris Hilton, Ludacris,
and of course, Leo,
whom he met while
financing, ready?
The Wolf of Wall Street
movie with Najib's stepson,
Riza Aziz.
Jho Low even gave Leo a Picasso
as a token of his friendship,
you know, like friends do.
It's symptomatic of
exactly what happens
in these kleptocracy cases.
The money has gone global.
While Jho Low partied
across the globe,
the Prime Minister and
his wife, Rosmah Mansor,
lived the high life,
complete with mansions,
fancy cars, and Birkin bags.
And all of this while Malaysia's
national debt bloomed.
It sounds like they gave you some
pretty salacious stories, too.
It's not like they were
covertly doing this
and hoping nobody noticed.
No journalist would
write a critical piece
about the government.
In fact, they would
be too frightened
to look into a critical
piece about the government.
So, what I was doing was
saying hey, that's,
journalism is about
criticising authority,
it's about holding
authority to account,
and this story rumbled on.
He tried to crack down on it.
He tried to crack down on me.
From that point onwards,
for the next two years,
you had a prime minister
pitching his sheer power
to prevent his self being
kicked out of office,
and that just made
people even more angry.
One of the people who read
about Najib's exploits
and got a little fired up
had a lot of spray paint
and a lot of stickers.
Street artist, Fahmi Reza.
I think how I got my
political consciousness
and this, this spirit of
rebellion that I have,
yeah, it comes from punk music.
And for people who say that,
"This punk is not in line
with our Eastern values,"
I just say, "Fuck you."
Fahmi was sick of his
government stealing
from the people, and he used
that frustration to fuel art,
making posters portraying
Najib as a literal clown.
This poster says, we're
all corrupt down here.
Can you tell me a little bit about
how it affects everyday
Malaysians on a daily basis?
The prime minister
and his wife live in
this luxurious lifestyle.
Carrying Birkin bags and diamonds,
while people are still
living in poverty,
without running
water, clean water,
and without electricity
and some without housing,
and the 1MDB company
committed a huge debt
because of corruption and also
because of bad investment,
and who is forking over the money?
It's us. It's the taxpayers.
Back in 2015, the
government introduced
a new tax system, the GST.
The Goods and Services Tax.
Trying to take more money from us
to pay for their debt, you
know, their corruption.
And after they introduced the
GST, you can immediately
see the higher cost of living.
It's more expensive for
people to just buy food.
That's how, I think, it
affects us every single day.
I think for some of us who
just won't take it any more
We do this. We do this.
You need an outlet, sure, yeah.
I came up with this image.
That's the first poster I did.
Oh, cool.
So I just took Najib's portrait
from his Facebook page,
and just drew the
clown face over
over his face.
And I posted it on all my
social media accounts.
I assume at some point
that shit got real.
The culture of fear
in Malaysia is real
because the police, you
know, and the authorities
have so much power and
can just arrest you,
and that's what happened to me.
I was found guilty and
sentenced to prison
over a simple tweet.
- For how long?
- One month jail
and a thirty thousand
ringgit fine.
That's about $6-7,000 US dollars.
Over the next one, two years,
the clown caricature
turned into a symbol of protest.
It expanded into a whole movement
of defiance and resistance
against Najib and his
corrupt government.
People like Fahmi and Clare
used their voices to fan the
flames of that resistance.
And soon, the floodgates
opened and new voices joined,
rising up to take Najib down.
Can you describe your
political relationship
to your father now?
Who's your dad, why are
we talking to you?
Who's my daddy? Okay,
my father is
I didn't mean who's your daddy,
but I guess, sure,
who's your daddy?
Nurul Izzah Anwar is a
Malaysian member of Parliament
who was arrested for speaking
out against the ruling party.
She was sticking up for her dad,
an opposition leader who had
been jailed multiple times
by the Malaysian
government on charges
that many believed were
politically motivated.
Your father had spoken
out against corruption
for a very long time.
For Najib's coalition,
it was just too much.
It was just, like, in four face,
you know, the corruption.
It's like, this showcase
of ostentatious wealth.
My God, Birkin handbags.
We have the record
we hold the record
for the most Birkin
handbags in the world.
People were also feeling
the economic pinch.
Remember, he decides to introduce
the Goods & Services Tax regime.
Prices went up, and their
pay wasn't improving.
So it came as a shock,
because Malaysia's a
welfare-based state, okay?
You know, a lot of
assistance, we really care
about narrowing the gap
between rich and poor.
Poverty is an issue.
I have kids in the low income
housing in Kuala Lumpur,
struggling to even eat
more than once a day.
The malnutrition is
worse than Ghana.
After a while, it was a
perfect storm, right?
Because people just could
not swallow it any more.
On Election Day 2018,
all the polls said
that Najib's ruling party was
a shoo-in to retain power.
But a fired up populace
came out in record numbers
to prove the polls wrong and
voted him out of power.
The new Prime Minister
was 92-year-old
Mahatir Mohamed, and his
new second-in-command?
Anwar Ibrahim, Nurul's father,
now released from prison
in a turnaround that was
compared to Nelson Mandela.
Now, the people are looking to you
for anti-corruption
measures for progress.
How do you sort through
what's doable,
what's important, what to use
your political capital on?
It will be a tough
time for Malaysia.
Economically, we're
going to take the hit
from the debt, the ballooning
debt, thanks to 1MDB.
And we have to manage it properly
to ensure the average
Malaysian doesn't feel that.
So, no matter what happens, we've
got to finish this, right?
Najib and his Birkin-bag-loving
wife had assets seized
and were both charged
with corruption.
Charges were also filed
against Jho Low,
who went into hiding.
To add insult to injury, Leo
even rejected his gift,
turning the Picasso
over to the feds.
With Nurul's father poised
to lead the country,
there's hope on the horizon for
a corruption-free Malaysia.
But how realistic is it to
totally eradicate corruption
once it's infiltrated a society
at the highest levels?
I don't have to go
far to find out.
Because Malaysia's close
neighbour, Singapore,
which actually used to be
part of Malaysia until 1965,
has a reputation for being
almost scarily corruption-free.
But before we find out
how this island nation
got so squeaky clean,
there are a few things
I need to get out of my system.
Singapore is probably best-known
for its extremely un-chill laws.
For instance, not
flushing a public toilet
is a $150 fine.
Or say I had some
important business
and I had to borrow
my neighbour's wifi,
in Singapore, that's hacking.
I'm looking at a
possible $10,000 fine
and maybe three years in the pen.
Or maybe I just want to enjoy
a nice tropical breeze
while I iron my pants.
Being naked in your own
home with the windows open
can cost you up to $2,000
and three months in prison.
Playing a musical instrument
in a way that causes
public annoyance
might cost you a grand.
Other things to
avoid, selling gum,
drinking water on a train
platform, feeding pigeons.
Oh, and graffiti could mean
jail time, a hefty fine,
and between three and eight
strokes of the cane.
So, keep the onions,
keep the mushrooms,
and, and extra sauce
but just no cheese.
I know that's a little
bit of a weird,
this is not illegal, I'm
just ordering a pizza.
Okay, I'm ready.
Singapore's strict laws are
part of a bottom-up approach
to fighting corruption.
If everyone's too afraid to
even think about small crimes,
there's no way they'll risk
trying the bigger stuff.
I mean, would you take a bribe
in a country with kiosks
encouraging you to snitch
on your corrupt friends
and neighbours?
Corruption is something
like a form of cancer.
It will start small, but
if you don't eradicate it
at the early stage, it will
spread to all parts of the body.
When that happens, the whole
body system will collapse.
Chin Wee Liam is the
deputy director
of Public Investigations,
here at Singapore's Corrupt
Practises Investigations Bureau,
a government agency that
is obviously very serious
about corruption and very proud
of being very serious about it.
The CPIB Office even has
an anti-corruption museum,
which enshrines great moments
at hardcore policing.
A domestic helper was
found flouting the rules,
by drinking water
inside a station.
The security officer
caught her doing that,
and he actually asked
for $300 to let her go.
For this case, we actually
prosecuted the security officers.
Okay.
It seems to be a very,
very petty offence,
but if you allow this to happen,
you can imagine the consequences.
Our founding fathers,
they were determined
to stamp out corruption
in Singapore.
Right from the onset.
So in Singapore, we
basically adopted
a zero-tolerance approach.
The approach seemed to work.
Singapore's anti-corruption
reputation drew business
and that led to real
economic benefits.
Foreigners felt safe
investing here,
making it one of the
premier financial
and banking centres of Asia.
Last year, in 2017
we actually investigated
a total of 103 cases.
Are there patterns in
the types of corruption
that you do see
actually taking place?
The majority of it, they
are petty offences,
but we do have a fair share
of corruption involving
a senior public servant or
prominent business people
in the private sector.
It seems like we should note here
that despite having a sterling
Transparency International rank,
Singapore's ranking for
press freedom is abysmal,
so, it's hard to get
any unbiased insight
into the types of grand corruption
that may be going on unreported.
But last year, a major
scandal did break,
that state-linked Singaporean
oil rig-builder, Keppel Inc,
was paying bribes to
secure overseas business.
The scandal shook
Singapore's citizens,
like business school
professor, Eugene Tan.
What is very upsetting
for Singaporeans
when it came to the Keppel case,
is that Keppel is a
government-linked company.
Linked to the government
of Singapore.
Yes. These companies would
never dare to engage
in blatant corrupt practises
within Singapore.
But it seems that they operate
by a different set of rules
when they are abroad.
Is this idea of no corruption,
being strict at every cost,
is that sustainable for a
country like Singapore?
It is a constant struggle.
When we gained self-government
from the British,
corruption was fairly endemic,
and there's nothing here, right.
Most of our foods are imported
our water is imported as well.
- No natural resources.
- No natural resources.
That meant that we had to
to make ourselves
relevant to the world
on our own terms and
what could work for us
would be a place where people
could come and do business
invest here, you know,
explore the region as well.
Corruption has to
be non-negotiable
because I think society would be
dramatically impoverished and
investors would avoid us.
I mean, "trust" to
me is, I think
our currency.
So I think there is no
room for complacency.
If you talk about the
fight against corruption,
it means doing the right thing
even when no one is watching.
But, if a hardcore
zero-tolerance approach
to corruption like Singapore's
isn't fool-proof,
what are some other ideas
for stopping corruption?
To find out, I have
to go back to India,
where a maverick thinker
has an unusual take.
Professor Kaushik Basu was Chief
Economist at the World Bank
and was also the Chief
Economic Advisor
to the government of India.
He says that we're handling
corruption all wrong.
Professor Basu thinks
that the surest way
to eliminate India's biggest
corruption problem, bribery,
is not to crack down
on it Singapore-style,
but to treat it like
all human vices
that metastasise in the
dark, and legalise it.
When you see India on
the list of rankings
of most- and
least-corrupt countries,
India is not at the
top of that list.
- No, right.
- It is not the most corrupt
No. No.
Or anywhere near the most corrupt.
India is a country with
very sophisticated laws,
but a surfeit of that,
so virtually everyone
is violating some law,
because it's so complex.
You do want to clean that up
and make it possible for
people to be law-abiding.
Now, what was your solution
to deal with this?
You see, it struck me there's
something in the Indian law,
Prevention of
Corruption Act, 1988.
It says that, "For
bribery is dreadful.
If whether you give a
bribe or take a bribe,
you are equally guilty."
So, by Indian law, all the
people I met at dinner
in Pune are technically criminals,
just for paying a bribe.
The law makes it worse,
because in the end you collude.
After giving a bribe, you collude
with the person who has taken it.
If you make bribe-giving
a legitimate activity,
bribe-taking you're guilty
then after I give the
bribe, I'm not guilty
and I'm willing to speak.
So I was being very
much the economist
and I thought this was a
nerdy idea I'm posting,
never anticipated the
political fall out from that.
So, what was the fallout
after you posted this?
People thought it was a
dreadfully immoral suggestion
that I had posted on a
government website.
I thought if that minimal
step can be taken,
and never was I
deluded to think that
this was going to take
care of the problem,
but it will immediately
begin to rupture,
and you'll begin to think
of this as demeaning.
"I won't put up with that."
Like many legalise-it
advocates before him,
Basu was ridiculed for his
anti-corruption strategy,
and his idea was not put into law.
But does he have a point?
Secrecy breeds corruption,
and corruption requires secrecy.
Corruption lives in the
dark, preys on the poor,
and refuses to die.
It's a powerful,
vitality-draining vampire.
And heroes, like Fahmi and Clare,
they're trying desperately
to drag it into the light.
Maybe just talking
about it openly,
without fear of the repercussions,
robs the corruptors of
some of their power.
Corruption is kind of like
the global economy itself,
in our day-to-day lives,
most of us only see
tiny parts of it,
extremely close up,
so, we never get a full sense
of what a huge, hulking,
hungry fucker it really is.
It's a giant beast,
wrapped around us,
guiding our moves, from what
we buy to what we value
to the bribes invisibly
greasing the wheels around us.
The only way you can get
close to understanding it,
let alone taming it is
to stand back far enough
to take in the whole hairy thing.
Yeah.
Two and
Kal, sport, whatever, take it.
What's your name?
Sorry.
This has turned very weird.
How much was the
Oh, my God.
Oh, no, not this.
- Not this one.
- No?
Okay, I'll
Today's episode
explores corruption.
Call me cynical,
but I feel like we're living
in very corrupt times.
Everywhere you look,
people in lofty
positions are using
those positions
to enrich themselves.
Sometimes, the powerful steer
important government contracts
to their cronies.
Sometimes, they charge bribes
for essential services.
And sometimes, they preside
over the gross misuse of funds
intended, sorry, can we just
cut for a second, please?
Do we really not have the budget
for a nicer backdrop or like
a location or something?
What about the plant?
What about the plant?
It's a very expensive plant.
Ow, what are you?
No, shiny, like this one.
Okay, sorry, my bad.
I, I'm being an asshole.
Sorry, sorry, everybody.
Don't worry about it.
My mouth, no, not a twenty.
Mm, yeah, there we go.
Aight, from the top,
what's his name?
Kal, baby.
This is corruption.
Whether you like it or not,
we're all connected by money.
I'm Kal Penn, exploring
this giant beast
that is the global economy.
There is a lot of
corruption in the world.
Across the globe, corruption costs
an estimated $2.6
trillion each year,
skimming 5% off the planet's GDP.
And according to the World Bank,
corruption is one
of the main reasons
the rich get richer, while
the poor stay poor.
Part of what makes
fighting corruption hard
is that it isn't just one
thing, like bribery.
It's a whole party platter
of slimy activities,
from selling Senate seats,
to taking joyrides on
taxpayer-funded planes.
But how does corruption
affect the economy?
To find out, I'm going
back to school,
to talk to a guy who
has spent years
studying that very question
Former US Secretary of
Labour, Robert Reich.
Thank you so much for doing this.
I have been a fan of
yours for a while.
Any chance that when
the show comes out
you can, you can mention it
to your 2.5 million
Facebook followers?
Well, we'll see.
I would like to help,
sure, in any way I can.
Okay, well, what if I
gave you an origami box?
It's beautiful,
absolutely beautiful.
Look, and there's even
something inside.
Oh, well yeah, that is money.
Now will you mention us?
No, no.
Damn.
Robert Reich apparently
is a man of integrity.
That's a refreshing
quality in a guy
who has spent a lot of
time in the White House,
three White Houses actually.
He worked as Labour
Secretary under Clinton,
for Carter before that,
and for Ford before that.
Now, Reich focuses on how
corruption on Wall Street
and in political lobbying
is hurting America.
He even made a movie about it.
How would you define corruption?
Corruption is the
payment for things
that are deemed
illegitimate by society,
that should not, according
to most people,
be bought or sold.
The guide is, would most people
feel that this is wrong?
If it's a payment that you
and I are involved in,
and I say, I don't
know, let's, you know,
you know, let's talk
about it like this
And by the way,
my hand is under the table,
and don't tell anybody else,
it's obvious we're getting
away with something
that is, if not against the law,
certainly against the
spirit of the law.
Okay, I would love
if you could talk me
through some of the more egregious
examples of corruption,
but then, also maybe,
some of the everyday ones
that we don't even think of
as being corrupt practises.
One example is kickbacks.
Suppose you are a doctor
and the drug company
is giving you a
little tip based upon
how much you prescribe my drug.
That's not good for the
person who is your patient.
Your obligation should
be to the patient,
not to the drug company.
So, if that is
definitely corruption,
then is our political
system corrupt?
And I'm thinking of
industries paying lobbyists
or making donations directly
to candidates themselves,
those candidates
then propose bills
or vote in the interest of these
companies, is that corruption?
That's a quid pro quo,
that's corruption.
A lot of Americans look
at that and they say,
hey, the game is rigged
in favour of the people
with a lot of money and big
corporations and Wall Street.
And are there smaller
forms of that?
- Are there things that
- Yes.
Petty bribery sends a signal
to an entire populace
that it's okay to be on the take,
it's okay to pilfer, it's okay
to take from the employer.
All of that is bad.
I mean, economic terms,
corruption is a huge negative.
The countries that
are most corrupt
are growing the slowest and
having the hardest time
getting out of poverty.
Once you open the
door to corruption,
everything flies through it.
The door gets wider
and wider and wider,
and the economy has a
very hard time growing.
You could fill a whole library
with the different ways
corruption creeps in
and stunts economies.
But sometimes, it starts small.
In India, low-level corruption,
known as petty corruption,
is rampant in the form of bribery.
According to an Ernst
& Young survey
of international business leaders,
83% said that bribery
is a deterrent
to foreign investment
in the country.
I'm meeting with a group of
middle-class professionals
in Pune to find out what living
with widespread low-level
corruption is like.
I understand how corruption works.
I've worked in India before,
so, I've had a taste of it.
As a kid, I remember coming in,
and there would be a long
line to go through customs,
and it was basically
It was a shakedown.
My mum is really tough
and she's like,
"I'm not paying you for this.
I'm not coming in to sell."
Like, she is a badass.
She's awesome. She's yelling back
at these corrupt customs officials
who are trying to shake
her down for money.
I am the kind of person
who is like your mother,
I'll be like, "I'm not
paying you for this nonsense
because I haven't
done anything wrong."
And if I have done
something wrong,
then I would rather
just pay the fine.
Has that actually happened?
Yes, I fought with
multiple police,
men and women
and my mother's had
to just step in,
and usually she
just pays them off.
What are you scared of? Is there
something you're scared of
- if you don't pick which one?
- Yeah.
Maybe they'll start
just abusing you,
or they'll start talking in a
rash language or something,
and I'm always in a hurry.
I've tried the excuse,
"I'm going on a, you
know, emergency."
Then they tell me,
"You are a doctor, no?
Okay, instead of 400,
just give us 200."
So, they'll ask you straight up.
Yeah, that happens.
You have a similar experience?
Yeah, I have a experience
with my family.
One of my cousins, he
met with an accident.
They're not that rich, so they
went to a public hospital,
which is government.
His leg is fractured. He
is not able to stand.
He asks the ward-boy to help him
to shift him on the second floor
because he had to
get it plastered.
He's asking for the bribe before
he'll give you the wheelchair
and then take you upstairs.
That has serious ramifications
for people's health.
Do you set money aside for that?
Like a rainy day for corruption?
Yeah, people do.
My friend's dad is a lawyer.
He's gotten people who
come to him and say,
"We wanna set up a
restaurant and we've done
"all the work that needs
to be done legally.
Now they just want us to
pay them under the table."
And, and my friend's
dad just said,
"Pay them. You know,
you could give me
"all the money you
want, and we still
wouldn't be able to fight them.
Just pay them."
I think mentally we are prepared.
Only thing is, we don't
know the exact amount
how much we'll have to pay.
So, that's why
there's no line item
in your budget for bribery, but
mentally, you are prepared
Mentally we are prepared.
And I would imagine, constantly
in a state of anxiety.
It's not hard to imagine
how small-scale
corruption like petty bribery
becomes commonplace.
But bribery is just one of
the many types of corruption
the global economy can dish out.
Here's what else is on the menu.
Corruption can take various forms,
but all of them are
connected to power.
Imagine if the person
running your cafeteria
exploited her power for more
than just free tater-tots.
There'd be rampant bribery,
where people pay to
be in my good graces.
Can I have a tray?
Could I have a tway?
I don't know, can you?
Go right ahead.
Nepotism is also a common
form of corruption,
like when I hired
my brother, Derek,
whose skill set includes
being related to me.
You're supposed to
say "bless you."
It's common courtesy.
There's also self-dealing,
because why should we buy desserts
from a reliable wholesaller
when I can pay myself?
Excuse me, there's a
Band-Aid in this.
Congratulations, Derek's
just a little bit clumsy.
Oh, and I almost forgot,
extortion and blackmail.
It would be a shame if
the wrestling coach
knew that you broke your diet
to have that yummy dessert.
Go in peace.
Also, there's embezzlement,
which is basically just theft.
Derek, put that
under the mattress.
You got it, Sis.
Corruption never tasted so sweet.
Is that a toenail?
Damn it, Derek.
Corruption is easy to spot when
it's just a few bad apples
running independent shakedowns.
But how do you know
when it's a bigger problem,
one that has worked its
way into the system?
To find out, I'm back in New York
to consult New Yorker
Reporter Adam Davidson.
Since Adam's also a
producer on this show,
I don't think he'll
mind if I just pop in.
- What's up?
- What's up, man?
How would you define corruption?
Is corruption like pornography?
You know it when you see it?
Corruption, we think
about it today
as this perversion, this bad thing
that happens to otherwise
well-functioning economies.
But that idea is so new.
If you think of a feudal monarch,
where the king has absolute power
and peasants are essentially
property of the king,
that is so corrupt that the
word corruption is meaningless,
because it's, there's nothing
being corrupted, it's just
- It's just how it is.
- It's just how it is.
So, to actually think
of it as corruption,
you first need to build a
functioning middle-class economy
that can be corrupted.
I would say it's a
helpful rule of thumb
to establish, is a country
fundamentally corrupt
as opposed to just
sometimes corrupt,
is to ask the president
or prime minister,
who's the biggest person in
concrete in this country?
And if that person knows
or, even more likely,
if that person is in active
business with that person,
that is a sign it's an
extremely corrupt country.
That's so interesting, okay.
Concrete is, in many ways,
the perfect substance
through which to look at
this issue of corruption,
both how it works and also,
how it hurts people.
Hold on, let me do some
creative visualisation.
Sure.
Yeah.
- Okay, go ahead.
- So
- Hell yeah.
- Anything made of concrete
has three components, what
they call aggregates,
sand and little stones
Cement, and water.
The cement, in a properly-built
concrete structure,
is about 15% of the
overall material,
but it's the vast
majority of the cost.
So, there's a huge incentive
to not use as much cement
and build a building.
It'll stay up, but it'll
eventually fall down.
When you hear on the news,
250,000 people died
in an earthquake, it is not
an earthquake disaster,
- it's a concrete disaster.
- Wow.
In 2010, a magnitude 7.0
earthquake hit Haiti,
causing $8.5 billion in damage
and killing over 200,000 people.
Many survivors pointed
to poorly-made concrete
as the reason the
destruction was so bad.
Bad concrete also had deadly
consequences in Turkey in 1999,
in Sichuan in 2008, and
in Mexico in 2017.
In some of these cases, the
same contractors who profited
from putting up bad concrete
benefited from the rebuilding.
In Haiti, many of the
construction contracts
went to a relative of the
Prime Minister's wife,
which raised a lot of questions.
What we see in
corrupt countries is
the basic material of life,
things like concrete,
potable water, electricity,
telephone lines, boring stuff,
become sources of enormous
wealth for the elite.
That's, that's, prevents a
society from developing.
That prevents an economy from
growing in a healthy way.
Oh, and just in case you
think it couldn't happen
in America, in 2006, six
contractors were arrested
for their role in
Boston's Big Dig.
It was the most expensive
highway project in history,
costing $243 billion
and 15 years of traffic jams,
not counting the damages paid
for the leaks, the flaws,
and one death.
Corruption is also a draw away
from legitimate enterprise.
It's a terrible force
that really strikes
at the very heart of what
makes the modern world good.
I'm starting to understand
how serious the consequences
of corruption can be.
Now, I wanna see
this beast up close.
Perhaps somewhere, I can
experience first-hand
a wide range of corrupt businesses
or maybe even see the
pristine habitats
of cronies in the wild.
Conveniently, those
are the exact things
offered by what might be Prague's
oddest tourist attraction,
the Corrupt Tour.
Alright.
So, this is the Corrupt Tour.
Actually, what we
show here in Prague
is the best of the worst.
Petr Sourek was inspired
to start the Corrupt Tour in 2012.
Since then, the Czech
Republic's Parliament
has never stopped serving up
heaping portions of
graft and sleaze
for him to work with.
Like in 2013, when
the Prime Minister,
who ran on an
anti-corruption platform,
resigned amidst a bribery scandal.
As a corrupt tour,
we like corruption.
We like that they do dodgy deals,
and that they do it
openly, in the public.
So, that gives you
more to work with.
Yeah, of course.
Prague is a city that never stops
giving Petr material,
like Blanka Tunnel,
a giant over-budget
construction pit,
basically, Eastern Europe's
version of the Big Dig,
and Motol Public Hospital,
where doctors were accused
of giving preferential care
to VIP patients.
Actually, the tour doesn't
go there any more
because administrators told
Petr he could only come around
if he paid them.
So, what do you love
about what you do?
What do you, what do you love
most about giving these tours?
Typically, corruption
feeds on business.
Now we're a business that
feeds on corruption.
- That's cool.
- In a legal way.
- I hear you.
- Okay, okay?
Petr's Corrupt Tour is a
light-hearted slap back
at the power players who have
ripped off the Czech people.
Snacks are included.
And now you can bite it.
- For the photo.
- I can bite it?
Are there nuts in it? Okay.
There's even a graduation
ceremony at the end.
I just handed over money for
this MFA in Corruption,
which seems about right.
For a deeper understanding,
I need to learn from someone
with a more serious
approach to the topic.
Hi, I'm here to see
David Ondracka.
- Please, come upstairs.
- Thank you.
Transparency International
is the world's leading
anti-corruption organisation,
with 100 offices around the globe,
and David Ondracka is part
of its crack corruption-fighting
team of experts.
Even though David's dead serious
about fighting corruption,
like everyone else
I've met in Prague,
he also has a little
weird fun with it,
like this educational
corruption board game.
The aim of the game
is really to get rich
and to get as many
politicians as you can.
So you're using money
to buy their influence.
I think a lot of people
who are watching
are gonna say, well,
we're just screwed.
- No.
- There's no way
that I could ever make a
difference in anything.
- No.
- And clearly, you don't
believe that, otherwise, you
wouldn't be working here.
Being an anti-corruption activist
is not a simple thing to do.
We are facing very
strong opponents
financially and power-wise.
But, we still can actually
make a difference.
But in many parts of
the world, it's a very
dangerous exercise, right.
And you're risking your life.
I'm a political person so
I like to play this role,
and it's something which
still keeps me excited.
One of the strategies
Transparency International
uses to stop corruption is its
Corruption Perception Index,
which surveys international
business people
and then ranks 180
countries around the world
on their reputation
for trustworthiness,
with number one being the best
and number 180 being the worst.
So, what's the cost of corruption
and why should people care?
Well, the simple answer
is money, of course.
The public money that
should be targeted on
specific public services
are being used to
someone's pocket,
that's very simple.
If you dig deeper,
you will find out
some unbelievable stories
and unbelievable processes.
Government deals are being
manipulated at an enormous level.
At the end of the day, it's the
highest form of corruption.
Well, that's all well and
good, but it's not funny.
How do we make it funny?
There's nothing funny
about corruption,
especially at high
levels of government.
That is grand corruption.
The ruler of my nation
keeps an iron grip
on his power and
wealth, and he demands
to be treated like a god.
Plus, he spies on everyone.
So, his inner circle continues
to get fat and rich,
while the rest of us
just toil in factories.
He even gave himself
a ridiculous title,
Santa Claus.
See, it all started when
dear Santa seized control
of a vital resource,
Christmas gifts.
Now, people have to bribe
him with milk and cookies.
Meanwhile, those of us who
actually make the gifts,
well, we're so malnourished
that we don't even
grow to full-size.
I mean, there's no
incentive for hard work
or innovation because Claus
Man will just take credit.
I mean, you don't even realise
how much control he
has over people.
Like parents, parents will
buy a gift for their kids,
with their own money,
and still say that
Santa brought it.
Dumb fucking sheep.
Wanna know another symptom
of grand corruption?
How about changing the rules
to only reward people who are nice
in the eyes of dear Santa, and
then punishing everyone else
with this crap.
Son of a bitch keeps lists.
People wait in line for hours,
just for the privilege
to beg at his feet.
Guy doesn't do shit.
He works, what, one day a year?
Ho, ho, ho, hey,
come sit on my lap.
Alright, jolly son of a bitch.
- He's in here.
- Oh, shit, North police.
Tell my story.
Don't you put me on a shelf.
One country that has
had its economy rocked
by grand corruption is number 62
in Transparency
International's ratings,
Malaysia.
Malaysia recently had the
biggest corruption scandal
in its history.
Prime Minister, you look happy.
Can I ask you, sir, why
you haven't resigned
over personal involvement
in the corruption scandal
of global proportions, sir?
Well, I think the big
headline grabber
was the revelation that
the Prime Minister
had taken one $700 million payment
into his own bank account
on one transaction.
This is Clare Rewcastle Brown,
a Malaysian-born journalist
who broke the story
that Malaysia's Prime
Minister Najib Razak
was taking money from a
state-owned investment fund
called 1MDB.
There was a lot of positive
publicity over it,
how he was going to
raise this money
and he was going to
invest it for Malaysia
and it was going to
make Malaysia very rich
through all these
profitable investments.
1MDB raised billions of dollars
from investors all
around the world,
including Goldman Sachs and
the Saudi royal family.
But that money wasn't coming
back to the Malaysian people.
The money went into
the bank accounts
of the proxy, Jho Low,
who has now got himself
an international reputation
as the playboy of the
Western world of that time.
- Girl, I wanna ♪
- Do it ♪
Jho Low was Prime Minister Najib's
money-laundering associate,
and he allegedly used 1MDB
money to finance yachts,
a Picasso, and to party
with the rich and famous,
like Paris Hilton, Ludacris,
and of course, Leo,
whom he met while
financing, ready?
The Wolf of Wall Street
movie with Najib's stepson,
Riza Aziz.
Jho Low even gave Leo a Picasso
as a token of his friendship,
you know, like friends do.
It's symptomatic of
exactly what happens
in these kleptocracy cases.
The money has gone global.
While Jho Low partied
across the globe,
the Prime Minister and
his wife, Rosmah Mansor,
lived the high life,
complete with mansions,
fancy cars, and Birkin bags.
And all of this while Malaysia's
national debt bloomed.
It sounds like they gave you some
pretty salacious stories, too.
It's not like they were
covertly doing this
and hoping nobody noticed.
No journalist would
write a critical piece
about the government.
In fact, they would
be too frightened
to look into a critical
piece about the government.
So, what I was doing was
saying hey, that's,
journalism is about
criticising authority,
it's about holding
authority to account,
and this story rumbled on.
He tried to crack down on it.
He tried to crack down on me.
From that point onwards,
for the next two years,
you had a prime minister
pitching his sheer power
to prevent his self being
kicked out of office,
and that just made
people even more angry.
One of the people who read
about Najib's exploits
and got a little fired up
had a lot of spray paint
and a lot of stickers.
Street artist, Fahmi Reza.
I think how I got my
political consciousness
and this, this spirit of
rebellion that I have,
yeah, it comes from punk music.
And for people who say that,
"This punk is not in line
with our Eastern values,"
I just say, "Fuck you."
Fahmi was sick of his
government stealing
from the people, and he used
that frustration to fuel art,
making posters portraying
Najib as a literal clown.
This poster says, we're
all corrupt down here.
Can you tell me a little bit about
how it affects everyday
Malaysians on a daily basis?
The prime minister
and his wife live in
this luxurious lifestyle.
Carrying Birkin bags and diamonds,
while people are still
living in poverty,
without running
water, clean water,
and without electricity
and some without housing,
and the 1MDB company
committed a huge debt
because of corruption and also
because of bad investment,
and who is forking over the money?
It's us. It's the taxpayers.
Back in 2015, the
government introduced
a new tax system, the GST.
The Goods and Services Tax.
Trying to take more money from us
to pay for their debt, you
know, their corruption.
And after they introduced the
GST, you can immediately
see the higher cost of living.
It's more expensive for
people to just buy food.
That's how, I think, it
affects us every single day.
I think for some of us who
just won't take it any more
We do this. We do this.
You need an outlet, sure, yeah.
I came up with this image.
That's the first poster I did.
Oh, cool.
So I just took Najib's portrait
from his Facebook page,
and just drew the
clown face over
over his face.
And I posted it on all my
social media accounts.
I assume at some point
that shit got real.
The culture of fear
in Malaysia is real
because the police, you
know, and the authorities
have so much power and
can just arrest you,
and that's what happened to me.
I was found guilty and
sentenced to prison
over a simple tweet.
- For how long?
- One month jail
and a thirty thousand
ringgit fine.
That's about $6-7,000 US dollars.
Over the next one, two years,
the clown caricature
turned into a symbol of protest.
It expanded into a whole movement
of defiance and resistance
against Najib and his
corrupt government.
People like Fahmi and Clare
used their voices to fan the
flames of that resistance.
And soon, the floodgates
opened and new voices joined,
rising up to take Najib down.
Can you describe your
political relationship
to your father now?
Who's your dad, why are
we talking to you?
Who's my daddy? Okay,
my father is
I didn't mean who's your daddy,
but I guess, sure,
who's your daddy?
Nurul Izzah Anwar is a
Malaysian member of Parliament
who was arrested for speaking
out against the ruling party.
She was sticking up for her dad,
an opposition leader who had
been jailed multiple times
by the Malaysian
government on charges
that many believed were
politically motivated.
Your father had spoken
out against corruption
for a very long time.
For Najib's coalition,
it was just too much.
It was just, like, in four face,
you know, the corruption.
It's like, this showcase
of ostentatious wealth.
My God, Birkin handbags.
We have the record
we hold the record
for the most Birkin
handbags in the world.
People were also feeling
the economic pinch.
Remember, he decides to introduce
the Goods & Services Tax regime.
Prices went up, and their
pay wasn't improving.
So it came as a shock,
because Malaysia's a
welfare-based state, okay?
You know, a lot of
assistance, we really care
about narrowing the gap
between rich and poor.
Poverty is an issue.
I have kids in the low income
housing in Kuala Lumpur,
struggling to even eat
more than once a day.
The malnutrition is
worse than Ghana.
After a while, it was a
perfect storm, right?
Because people just could
not swallow it any more.
On Election Day 2018,
all the polls said
that Najib's ruling party was
a shoo-in to retain power.
But a fired up populace
came out in record numbers
to prove the polls wrong and
voted him out of power.
The new Prime Minister
was 92-year-old
Mahatir Mohamed, and his
new second-in-command?
Anwar Ibrahim, Nurul's father,
now released from prison
in a turnaround that was
compared to Nelson Mandela.
Now, the people are looking to you
for anti-corruption
measures for progress.
How do you sort through
what's doable,
what's important, what to use
your political capital on?
It will be a tough
time for Malaysia.
Economically, we're
going to take the hit
from the debt, the ballooning
debt, thanks to 1MDB.
And we have to manage it properly
to ensure the average
Malaysian doesn't feel that.
So, no matter what happens, we've
got to finish this, right?
Najib and his Birkin-bag-loving
wife had assets seized
and were both charged
with corruption.
Charges were also filed
against Jho Low,
who went into hiding.
To add insult to injury, Leo
even rejected his gift,
turning the Picasso
over to the feds.
With Nurul's father poised
to lead the country,
there's hope on the horizon for
a corruption-free Malaysia.
But how realistic is it to
totally eradicate corruption
once it's infiltrated a society
at the highest levels?
I don't have to go
far to find out.
Because Malaysia's close
neighbour, Singapore,
which actually used to be
part of Malaysia until 1965,
has a reputation for being
almost scarily corruption-free.
But before we find out
how this island nation
got so squeaky clean,
there are a few things
I need to get out of my system.
Singapore is probably best-known
for its extremely un-chill laws.
For instance, not
flushing a public toilet
is a $150 fine.
Or say I had some
important business
and I had to borrow
my neighbour's wifi,
in Singapore, that's hacking.
I'm looking at a
possible $10,000 fine
and maybe three years in the pen.
Or maybe I just want to enjoy
a nice tropical breeze
while I iron my pants.
Being naked in your own
home with the windows open
can cost you up to $2,000
and three months in prison.
Playing a musical instrument
in a way that causes
public annoyance
might cost you a grand.
Other things to
avoid, selling gum,
drinking water on a train
platform, feeding pigeons.
Oh, and graffiti could mean
jail time, a hefty fine,
and between three and eight
strokes of the cane.
So, keep the onions,
keep the mushrooms,
and, and extra sauce
but just no cheese.
I know that's a little
bit of a weird,
this is not illegal, I'm
just ordering a pizza.
Okay, I'm ready.
Singapore's strict laws are
part of a bottom-up approach
to fighting corruption.
If everyone's too afraid to
even think about small crimes,
there's no way they'll risk
trying the bigger stuff.
I mean, would you take a bribe
in a country with kiosks
encouraging you to snitch
on your corrupt friends
and neighbours?
Corruption is something
like a form of cancer.
It will start small, but
if you don't eradicate it
at the early stage, it will
spread to all parts of the body.
When that happens, the whole
body system will collapse.
Chin Wee Liam is the
deputy director
of Public Investigations,
here at Singapore's Corrupt
Practises Investigations Bureau,
a government agency that
is obviously very serious
about corruption and very proud
of being very serious about it.
The CPIB Office even has
an anti-corruption museum,
which enshrines great moments
at hardcore policing.
A domestic helper was
found flouting the rules,
by drinking water
inside a station.
The security officer
caught her doing that,
and he actually asked
for $300 to let her go.
For this case, we actually
prosecuted the security officers.
Okay.
It seems to be a very,
very petty offence,
but if you allow this to happen,
you can imagine the consequences.
Our founding fathers,
they were determined
to stamp out corruption
in Singapore.
Right from the onset.
So in Singapore, we
basically adopted
a zero-tolerance approach.
The approach seemed to work.
Singapore's anti-corruption
reputation drew business
and that led to real
economic benefits.
Foreigners felt safe
investing here,
making it one of the
premier financial
and banking centres of Asia.
Last year, in 2017
we actually investigated
a total of 103 cases.
Are there patterns in
the types of corruption
that you do see
actually taking place?
The majority of it, they
are petty offences,
but we do have a fair share
of corruption involving
a senior public servant or
prominent business people
in the private sector.
It seems like we should note here
that despite having a sterling
Transparency International rank,
Singapore's ranking for
press freedom is abysmal,
so, it's hard to get
any unbiased insight
into the types of grand corruption
that may be going on unreported.
But last year, a major
scandal did break,
that state-linked Singaporean
oil rig-builder, Keppel Inc,
was paying bribes to
secure overseas business.
The scandal shook
Singapore's citizens,
like business school
professor, Eugene Tan.
What is very upsetting
for Singaporeans
when it came to the Keppel case,
is that Keppel is a
government-linked company.
Linked to the government
of Singapore.
Yes. These companies would
never dare to engage
in blatant corrupt practises
within Singapore.
But it seems that they operate
by a different set of rules
when they are abroad.
Is this idea of no corruption,
being strict at every cost,
is that sustainable for a
country like Singapore?
It is a constant struggle.
When we gained self-government
from the British,
corruption was fairly endemic,
and there's nothing here, right.
Most of our foods are imported
our water is imported as well.
- No natural resources.
- No natural resources.
That meant that we had to
to make ourselves
relevant to the world
on our own terms and
what could work for us
would be a place where people
could come and do business
invest here, you know,
explore the region as well.
Corruption has to
be non-negotiable
because I think society would be
dramatically impoverished and
investors would avoid us.
I mean, "trust" to
me is, I think
our currency.
So I think there is no
room for complacency.
If you talk about the
fight against corruption,
it means doing the right thing
even when no one is watching.
But, if a hardcore
zero-tolerance approach
to corruption like Singapore's
isn't fool-proof,
what are some other ideas
for stopping corruption?
To find out, I have
to go back to India,
where a maverick thinker
has an unusual take.
Professor Kaushik Basu was Chief
Economist at the World Bank
and was also the Chief
Economic Advisor
to the government of India.
He says that we're handling
corruption all wrong.
Professor Basu thinks
that the surest way
to eliminate India's biggest
corruption problem, bribery,
is not to crack down
on it Singapore-style,
but to treat it like
all human vices
that metastasise in the
dark, and legalise it.
When you see India on
the list of rankings
of most- and
least-corrupt countries,
India is not at the
top of that list.
- No, right.
- It is not the most corrupt
No. No.
Or anywhere near the most corrupt.
India is a country with
very sophisticated laws,
but a surfeit of that,
so virtually everyone
is violating some law,
because it's so complex.
You do want to clean that up
and make it possible for
people to be law-abiding.
Now, what was your solution
to deal with this?
You see, it struck me there's
something in the Indian law,
Prevention of
Corruption Act, 1988.
It says that, "For
bribery is dreadful.
If whether you give a
bribe or take a bribe,
you are equally guilty."
So, by Indian law, all the
people I met at dinner
in Pune are technically criminals,
just for paying a bribe.
The law makes it worse,
because in the end you collude.
After giving a bribe, you collude
with the person who has taken it.
If you make bribe-giving
a legitimate activity,
bribe-taking you're guilty
then after I give the
bribe, I'm not guilty
and I'm willing to speak.
So I was being very
much the economist
and I thought this was a
nerdy idea I'm posting,
never anticipated the
political fall out from that.
So, what was the fallout
after you posted this?
People thought it was a
dreadfully immoral suggestion
that I had posted on a
government website.
I thought if that minimal
step can be taken,
and never was I
deluded to think that
this was going to take
care of the problem,
but it will immediately
begin to rupture,
and you'll begin to think
of this as demeaning.
"I won't put up with that."
Like many legalise-it
advocates before him,
Basu was ridiculed for his
anti-corruption strategy,
and his idea was not put into law.
But does he have a point?
Secrecy breeds corruption,
and corruption requires secrecy.
Corruption lives in the
dark, preys on the poor,
and refuses to die.
It's a powerful,
vitality-draining vampire.
And heroes, like Fahmi and Clare,
they're trying desperately
to drag it into the light.
Maybe just talking
about it openly,
without fear of the repercussions,
robs the corruptors of
some of their power.
Corruption is kind of like
the global economy itself,
in our day-to-day lives,
most of us only see
tiny parts of it,
extremely close up,
so, we never get a full sense
of what a huge, hulking,
hungry fucker it really is.
It's a giant beast,
wrapped around us,
guiding our moves, from what
we buy to what we value
to the bribes invisibly
greasing the wheels around us.
The only way you can get
close to understanding it,
let alone taming it is
to stand back far enough
to take in the whole hairy thing.
Yeah.
Two and
Kal, sport, whatever, take it.
What's your name?
Sorry.
This has turned very weird.
How much was the
Oh, my God.
Oh, no, not this.
- Not this one.
- No?
Okay, I'll