The absence of a system-wide framework that deals with assets and interests, disclosures and conflicts of interest in Namibia could establish leeway for Fishrot cases, the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) has said. Speaking during the launch of the Namibian Governance Report in Windhoek on Friday, a research associate at IPPR, Frederico Links said there are no laws or measures in place to prevent another corruption scandal in the fishing industry. According to him, there is a need for a strong intervention from the State in this area in terms of anti-corruption. “In a country like Namibia, the Government, which dominates the economy must set the tone on fighting corruption,” he said, adding that the law which was amended to facilitate what is now known as the Fishrot scandal remains intact. “The new Fisheries Minister Albert Kawana promised to be transparent. But up to today, we don’t know who has fishing quotas or rights. If you go to the ministry website, it looks like it stopped working in 2012,” echoed IPPR Executive Director Graham Hopwood. According to him, the Fisheries Ministry operates in secrecy. “As part of our ongoing research we have requested information regarding companies that have quotas, rights, and details about the various species but haven’t received any responses yet,” said Hopwood. He added that the absence of meaningful asset declaration in place could hamper the effectiveness of systems, processes and institutions meant to fight graft. “For any system to work you need to have some verification systems in place. In parliament specifically, members of parliament can choose to obscure or hide anything during declaration because there is nobody within the system to verify the accuracy,” he said. Hopwood further suggested that Namibia look into the idea of publishing all key contracts between the government and those active in fisheries and the rest of the extractive sector. He also commended institutions involved in investigating and prosecuting in the Fishrot case. The report sets out to assess the governance record of President Hage Geingob’s first five years in office regarding two themes proclaimed as central to his intentions of promoting good governance, namely the installing of robust governance architecture and improvement of systems, processes and institutions. -NAMPA