New data has revealed a sharp rise in bribery within essential public services, with the process of obtaining a government-issued identity document emerging as the single most corruption-prone interaction Basotho face.
According to the latest survey findings published on Wednesday this week, more than one in five people (22 percent) who tried to obtain an ID document in the past year said they were forced to pay a bribe, give a gift, or do a favour to get what they needed.
This marks a six-percentage-point spike since 2022, and this signals a worsening trend in a country already struggling to contain petty corruption.
These findings come from Afrobarometer, a non-partisan pan-African research network that has conducted reliable, in-person public-opinion surveys across the continent since 1999, including in Lesotho as part of its 2024/2025 Round 10 survey.
By contrast, fewer citizens reported paying bribes for police assistance (12 percent) or medical care (four percent), even though these services are also essential for daily survival.
The fact that acquiring an ID, something that determines one’s access to social support, economic opportunities, banking, education, healthcare, voting, and travel, is now the most bribery-ridden public service exposes the extent to which state failure is undermining citizens’ basic rights.
The responsibility for issuing national IDs and passports in Lesotho lies with the Ministry of Local Government, Chieftainship, Home Affairs and Police (MoLG-HAP).
Within the Ministry, the Department of Passport Services handles applications, printing and distribution of travel documents, while the National Identity and Civil Registration (NICR) unit deals with national identity cards.
Under the legal framework of the Lesotho Passports and Travel Documents Act, 2018, the power to issue passports and travel documents is vested in the Minister.
Since 2022, Minister Lebona Lephema has held this portfolio. Under Lephema’s leadership, the ministry has publicly acknowledged serious challenges in passport and ID issuance, including a shortage of blank document stock, budget constraints, procurement issues, and supply-chain disruptions.
In April 2024, the ministry acknowledged to the parliamentary Law and Public Safety Committee that it lacked the budget to procure enough blank ID cards.
Reports from the NICR indicated that no IDs were procured during the previous fiscal year, leaving only 1,560 cards in stock, and forcing district offices to ration issuance, prioritising only emergency and high-priority cases.
Seven of the 10 most pressing issues Basotho want government to address, according to the Afrobarometer survey, relate directly to broken or failing public services.
After unemployment, which remains the nation’s top concern at 63 percent, citizens cited infrastructure and roads (47 percent), crime and security (29 percent), water supply (22 percent), and electricity (20 percent) as urgent priorities needing immediate action.
Education and health, two pillars any functioning society should consider sacred, barely inspire confidence, each mentioned by one in 10 respondents as an area demanding urgent government attention.
Majorities of respondents said the government was doing a “fairly bad” or “very bad” job on nearly every major service they rely on. 65 percent said the government was failing to provide adequate water and sanitation.
60 percent said it was failing to fight crime, 58 percent said it was failing to maintain roads and bridges, while 58 percent said it was failing to provide reliable electricity.
52 said it was failing to meet educational needs.
Only basic health services escaped this pattern of disapproval, with 55 percent saying government was doing a “good job,” a fragile bright spot in an otherwise bleak landscape.
Summary
- According to the latest survey findings published on Wednesday this week, more than one in five people (22 percent) who tried to obtain an ID document in the past year said they were forced to pay a bribe, give a gift, or do a favour to get what they needed.
- The fact that acquiring an ID, something that determines one’s access to social support, economic opportunities, banking, education, healthcare, voting, and travel, is now the most bribery-ridden public service exposes the extent to which state failure is undermining citizens’ basic rights.
- Under the legal framework of the Lesotho Passports and Travel Documents Act, 2018, the power to issue passports and travel documents is vested in the Minister.
Authored by our expert team of writers and editors, with thorough research.
