[ExI] government corruption

[Stathis Papaioannou]

2009/3/1 painlord2k at libero.it <painlord2k at libero.it>:

> Do you have a link?
> Because I can believe about the outcry, it is a bit more unbelievable about
> the consequences of the scandal.
>
> I know in Rome they discovered a public large hospitals that have not its
> tubes (the anti-fire ones) connected with the water pipes.
> Sure the managers were not fire immediately.

Your experience of Italy should perhaps not be generalised to the
whole world. I was in Greece last year, and I was shocked at the
casual attitude people had to corruption in the public hospital
system, where it was common for staff to require bribes simply for
doing their jobs. It was part of a general conviction that large
institutions were out to cheat and exploit you, and therefore as a
customer or employee you were within your rights to try to do the same
to them. This seemed to apply not only to government departments, but
also private businesses, from self-employed taxi drivers to hotels to
banks. I ended up once spending half a day trying to find out what
fees the bank would charge me if I didn't use my account for a
prolonged period: no-one knew, and the effort of finding out seemed to
visibly upset them. And apparently things have improved greatly
compared to when Greece first joined the EU!


-- 
Stathis Papaioannou