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Celebrating The Lab’s 5th Birthday With A New Strategy for Building Accountability

By: Blair Glencorse, Executive Director. Today, the Accountability Lab turns 5 years old. What better way to celebrate a birthday than to reflect on what we’ve done, think about what we’ve learned, and spell out where we’re going in a new strategy?! We’re proud of this new roadmap, which has grown out of a lot of hard work in West Africa and South Asia, hundreds of conversations with other organizations and individuals working in this space and significant field and desk research into accountability eco-systems to understand where we can add the most value. This refresh comes at an important [...]

2017-03-16T00:00:00+00:0016th March 2017|

Pakistan celebrates its first Integrity Idol

In a corrupt country, the public vote for the most upstanding bureaucrat By: This article was originally published by Apolitical. There is no glitter or pop music, but Integrity Idol aims to do much more than choose a hit new boyband. The international competition puts on TV shows to find the most upstanding officials in countries with endemic corruption – Nepal, Pakistan, Liberia and Afghanistan among them – and hold them up as role models to encourage the rest. Run by the NGO Accountability Lab, it began in Nepal (read Apolitical’s interview with the first ever idol here) and has [...]

2017-03-09T00:00:00+00:009th March 2017|

Integrity Idol: Using fame to fight corruption in Mali

By: Charlotte Renfield-Miller. This blog post was originally published by IREX. Since the coup in 2012, Mali has been plagued by corruption, which has hindered the government’s ability to combat terrorism. Mandela Washington Fellow Kondo Moussa is having none of it—and he’s fighting back against corruption by turning honest leaders into rock stars with Integrity Idol. Mali established a constitutional government in early 2014, but the country faces difficulty in uniting its factions and establishing peace. The government is led by a small political elite driven primarily by self-interest. For example, President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta was accused of corruption during his [...]

2017-02-24T00:00:00+00:0024th February 2017|

Integrity Summit 2016: What Can We Learn from Integrity Idols in Pakistan?

By: Fayyaz Yaseen, Country Representative, Accountability Lab Pakistan In January 2017, the Accountability Lab brought together the winners of Integrity Idol Pakistan 2016, experts in anti-corruption and governance (including Brig Mussadiq Abbasi, former Director General of the National Accountability Bureau, Pakistan), Executive Director of the Accountability Lab, Blair Glencorse, and around 25 other representatives from civil society organizations. Unpacking Integrity The group discussed the dynamics of integrity in Pakistan, the ways in which individuals can resist the pressure to be corrupt, and how a system for accountability can be developed within the civil service. Key points that emerged from the [...]

2017-02-21T00:00:00+00:0021st February 2017|

‘Integrity Idol’ winner vows to use prize to train health workers in post-Ebola Liberia

Reporting by James Giahyue; Editing by Katy Migiro and Astrid Zweynert. This article was originally published by Thomson Reuters Foundation. The winner of Integrity Idol, a Liberian reality TV show, plans to use his prize money to train health workers as the country is still reeling from the world's worst Ebola outbreak. Pharmacist Bocakarie Sakilla beat 1,000 other contestants to win a $2,000 prize, presented to him by President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. "I see it as a victory, especially for our pharmacist profession," Sakilla told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. "In Liberia, pharmacists are not known, they are always at the back... [...]

2017-02-06T00:00:00+00:006th February 2017|

Why We Worship Integrity Idols

By Samita Thapa and Suresh Chand What does it mean to have integrity? There is a widespread perception that the Nepali civil service is deeply corrupt. The solution to this problem is not in “naming and shaming” the rule breakers but in “naming and faming” those officials doing the right things. The Integrity Idols we have had the honor to “name and fame” are incredible- from Pradip Kanel who changed CDO office to people’s office-a place of ‘people-work’ instead of an exercise in paper-work; to Gyan Mani Nepal and Dor Bikram Shrees  who transformed education in Panchthar and Gulmi respectively; [...]

2017-01-31T00:00:00+00:0031st January 2017|

Integrity Idol puts public honesty number one

School prinicipal Dor Bikram Shrees, right, is winner of the Integrity Idol Nepal 2016 award. Photograph: Integrity Idol Nepal By: Ben Quinn. This article was originally published by The Guardian. International television show Integrity Idol aims to do for upstanding officials what primetime talent contests have achieved for aspiring pop stars There is no glitter, diva-like tantrums or brilliantly lit stages, but the emotions on show are no less genuine for that. A Nepalese school principal, a Pakistani lab assistant and a Liberian janitor are among this year’s finalists in an international contest that aims to do for honesty [...]

2017-01-30T00:00:00+00:0030th January 2017|

Pharmacist Named 2016 Integrity Idol Winner of the Year

By: Gbatemah Senah. This article was originally published by The Bush Chicken. Photo: Gbatemah Senah A pharmacist in the government hospital in Tubmanburg, Bomi has been named the Integrity Idol winner for 2016. Bockarie Sakilla was announced as the winner on Wednesday at an official award ceremony in where President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and scores of government officials were in attendance. The 2016 Integrity Idol is the second iteration of a nationwide campaign by Accountability Lab Liberia in partnership with the Open Society Initiative of West Africa, UNDP, the Swedish Embassy in Monrovia, and the European Union. The program [...]

2017-01-29T00:00:00+00:0029th January 2017|

You Name, We Fame: Citizen Feedback in Action

By: Blair Glencorse, Founder and Executive Director of Accountability Lab. This blog post was originally published by Feedback Labs. We recently completed our global Integrity Idol campaign – an annual TV show and citizen movement to find, film and celebrate honest government officials. It shifts the negative conversation around corruption from “naming and shaming” the wrong-doers, to a positive “naming and faming” public servants that are building accountability. Previous winners have included an incredible education official from eastern Nepal; a nurse from central Liberia and an army chief from northern Mali. Now we are building a network of these officials [...]

2017-01-28T00:00:00+00:0028th January 2017|

‘Integrity Idol’ hunts for honest bureaucrats

This article was originally published by The Nation. Pakistan routinely ranks among the world's most corrupt countries, but reality TV show "Integrity Idol" aims to tackle the scourge by highlighting some of the nation's honest bureaucrats. A Punjab official who cracked down on bribery in his district linked to land registration came out tops in the show's finale Wednesday. Members of the public initially nominated some 300 government employees who were subsequently whittled down to five by a panel of official law enforcement experts who performed background checks. "I told all of the inhabitants of the area that if any [...]

2017-01-26T00:00:00+00:0026th January 2017|
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