Enhanced plan to fight graft

PUTRAJAYA: The government will launch the National Anti-Corruption Strategy (NACS) 2024-2028, focusing on enhancing anti-corruption efforts to improve governance and integrity in public administration and government-linked companies.

Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) chief commissioner Tan Sri Azam Baki said the NACS 2024-2028, which will replace the National Anti-Corruption Plan (NACP) 2019-2023, would be officially launched by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim at the Putrajaya International Convention Centre tomorrow, Bernama reported.

In a media statement, Azam said NACS was a government initiative to develop a national anti-corruption strategy in line with Article 5 of the United Nations Convention Against Corruption, which mandates all member countries, including Malaysia, to produce a document serving as the primary reference for national-level anti-corruption initiatives.

“The NACP, which concluded in 2023, has been recognised as one of the indirect factors that contributed to Malaysia’s improved ranking in the Corruption Perceptions Index in 2019.

“As a result, Malaysia rose from the 61st position in 2018 to 51st spot.

“For this reason, NACS was developed with a focus on five main strategies: education, public accountability, public voice, enforcement, and incentives,” he said.

Azam added that to ensure the effectiveness of implementing NACS, a comprehensive monitoring mechanism will be established by the MACC’s Governance and Compliance Monitoring Bureau, where monitoring and evaluation reports will be presented to the National Governance Cabinet Special Committee chaired by the Prime Minister for endorsement before being submitted to the Cabinet and Parliament.

He said MACC is fully prepared to coordinate various programmes under the strategies outlined in NACS.

“MACC is also highly hopeful of getting the cooperation of all parties to implement NACS successfully over the next five years, which aligns with the national aspiration of building Malaysia Madani, he added.