STA, 27 November 2018 - Successful Slovenian businessmen frequently get the feeling that politicians and municipal representatives expect gifts or high-value rewards in exchange for conducting business, according to a survey by Deloitte Slovenija.
All in all, 72% of the respondents assessed the business environment as moderately corrupt, with only a tenth saying corruption is low, the head of Deloitte forensics for the Adriatic region Yuri Sidorovich told the press on Tuesday.
In recent years there have been no substantial efforts to tackle graft. "The question is not how much corruption there is in a country, it is what the state is doing about it," he said.
Problems seen with public projects, judiciary and law enforcement
He summed up the results by saying that Slovenians are disproportionately honest, but they are also disproportionately tolerant to those who steal.
Deloitte set out to poll successful businessmen, including the wealthiest Slovenians and members of management and supervisory boards.
It received only 53 completed surveys. "Many responded, but they did not want to participate because of questions regarding anonymity," said Deloitte manager Aleš Berham.
More than one in three said that public projects are overpriced because of corruption, and almost half said they did not trust Slovenian judiciary and law enforcement when it comes to white collar crime.
Sidorovich said that not a single respondent fully trusted law enforcement. "Is it normal that people with access to information, who know what is going on in the financial world do not trust law enforcement?," he wondered.
