Editorial
Proposed changes to ACC Act
Defeats purpose of eliminating corruption
WE welcome the decision of the parliamentary standing committee on law ministry to further scrutinise sections of the Anti-Corruption Commission (Amendment) Bill 2011 before finalising it. We especially thank the Finance Minister who voiced strong support for the parliamentary body's stance against the proposed provision of the bill which stipulates that, before corruption charges can be filed against a judge, magistrate or public servant, permission must be obtained from the government. This proposed version seems almost designed to protect the corrupt in high places.
The ACC was constituted with a mandate of rooting out corruption -- which robs us of some 2% of our national GDP. The ACC chief had previously complained of the body being made toothless and has recently demanded financial autonomy and administrative power. If the proposed changes were to come through, how would we distinguish between the former anti-graft body, the Bureau of Anti-Corruption and the ACC, which would simply become an appendage of the executive? As the Finance Minister himself has said, under the proposed bill, only "small fry" would be brought to book. We have seen in the case of Pakistan that, under such a law where permission to file corruption charges against civil servants had to be sought from the government, only one person has ever been charged. The anti-graft bodies of the UK, USA and India, which are in no way connected to the executive, are ones we should rather replicate.
Containing corruption was an election promise of the government. Contrary to sane advice from civil society, the media and development partners to not dilute the authority of the ACC, however, the government shows signs of appeasing the bureaucracy. We urge the government not to succumb to bureaucratic pressure and to discard the controversial provision of acquiring permission from the government to file graft cases against civil servants, for its own sake and for that of the nation. If the law becomes conditional, the nation will never be freed of corruption. We must have a zero tolerance policy towards corruption and to ensure this, the ACC must be strengthened further and not made to become a redundant appendage of the government.
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