Corruption in Mauritius

Corruption in Mauritius follows the familiar patterns of state-based corruption, namely government officials abusing their political powers for private gain in the country of Mauritius.

Some Mauritians have taken advantage of the government's corruption. In the local dialect, those who adopt such means are called traceurs or magouilleurs. Familiar methods include falsifying home addresses to get a child into a perceived "star school" or bribing officials to obtain a driver's license.

On 28 May 1979, Member of Parliament Harish Boodhoo called for a general mobilization against corruption in a mass meeting that drew 35,000 people. Cables leaked from the US embassy in 2008 described corruption in Mauritius as "pervasive and ingrained". In May 2020, the European Commission identified Mauritius as a high-risk country, with strategic deficiencies in its anti-money-laundering and counter-terrorism-financing regime. According to a former US ambassador to Mauritius, the Mauritian-based Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) has lost its credibility.

According to Transparency International's 2025 Corruption Perceptions Index, Mauritius scored 48 on a scale from 0 ("highly corrupt") to 100 ("very clean"). When ranked by score, Mauritius ranked 61st among the 182 countries in the Index, where the country ranked first is perceived to have the most honest public sector. For comparison with regional scores, the best score among sub-Saharan African countries was 68, the average was 32 and the worst was 9. For comparison with worldwide scores, the best score was 89 (ranked 1), the average was 42, and the worst was 9 (ranked 181, in a two-way tie).