TRANSPARENCY International Malaysia (TI-M) has urged the government to consider an MP’s suggestion for the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission’s (MACC) annual report be presented directly to Parliament for debate.
The anti-corruption watchdog was responding to Pasir Gudang MP Hassan Abdul Karim’s call for an overhaul of the current practice which saw MACC’s annual report being presented first to the Anti-Corruption Advisory Board and the Special Committee on Corruption before being sent to the prime minister to be presented in Parliament.
Hassan also said that the MACC report should be directly brought to the Dewan Rakyat and the Dewan Negara to be presented and debated in an effort to overcome corruption.
“Under the MACC Act 2009, Section 14(1) stipulates that a Special Committee on Corruption has the responsibility to advise the prime minister on the corruption problem in the country after examining the commission’s annual report and clarifying the comments of the Advisory Board,” TI-M president Dr Muhammad Mohan said in a statement today (June 30).
“The MP who is a member of the Special Committee on Corruption seems to express his frustration on the current practice of submitting the annual reports to two separate committees before it is sent to the prime minister to be presented in Parliament which is very bureaucratic.”
According to Muhammad, the country has serious problems tackling corruption and both the prime minister and the government need timely information to act swiftly.
“The government should consider removing all the bureaucracy and at the same time make the MACC truly independent by amending the MACC Act as part of the overall MACC reforms,” he added.
In pointing out that the current practice is no longer relevant, Hassan, via a statement on Monday (June 26), had noted that even the Human Rights Commission of Malaysia’s (Suhakam) annual reports and Auditor-General’s reports are presented and debated in Parliament.
Hassan further proposed that after the MACC report was presented and debated in Parliament, the three monitoring panels formed under the MACC Act 2009 needed to do a detailed and comprehensive follow-up.
He said this ultimately enables the Special Committee on Corruption to submit a report to the prime minister while at the same time fulfilling its function under Section 14(1)(a) of the MACC Act 2009, which is to advise the prime minister on any aspect of corruption in Malaysia. – June 30, 2023
Main pic credit: The Star
