LETTER | What stand do the political coalitions have on corruption?

LETTER | I refer to the tabulated manifestoes of the three political party coalitions - Pakatan Harapan, Perikatan Nasional and Barisan Nasion - as reported by Malaysiakini, and I wish to comment on the proposed anti-corruption actions.

The National Anti-Corruption Plan 2019-2023 (NACP) was launched by the then prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad in 2019. 

I am surprised that the summary manifestos on the subject of anti-corruption from these three political coalitions do not make a single mention of this NACP document or build their proposals based on this, or even move on to improve the NACP in a few areas.

The rakyat’s money was spent in creating this NACP and since it was launched (and after three PMs), there has never been a question about the extent to which the NACP has been successfully implemented, and especially, where it has failed or delayed in implementation and the reasons for these failures or delays (or programmes dropped completely). 

If the parties disagree, even partially with what the NACP says, then say so and be responsible and accountable so that the rakyat will know whether their money was put to good use in both creating the NACP and implementing the NACP.

Transparency and accountability are very basic in work against corruption and the deafening silence about the NACP is unacceptable.

Much of what is mentioned in the NACP is fundamental and has a cascading impact or implications on many other initiatives in Malaysia. As an example, the UN’s Sustainability Development Goals (SDG) that Malaysia has committed to, is mentioned in the NACP:

“Goal 16 (Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions) espouses the commitment to fight against corruption, increase transparency, tackle illicit financial flows and improve access to information. There exists a clear consensus among the UN member countries on the fact that should there be no action to reduce corruption, there will be serious impediment to achieving the other SDG’s goals.”

The above quote itself invites a lot of questions surrounding the required and much-anticipated, holistic anti-corruption measures (mostly already detailed in the NACP) and especially questions pertaining to whether our SDG goals will be successful or not, given the ambiguous commitment in the manifestos.

Come 2030 when we account for our successes in our SDG implementation, we cannot afford an excuse that says, “We are not completely successful in implementing this and that areas because of blah, blah, blah...” when the root of the problem is unsuccessful or inadequate anti-corruption measures (leadership, commitment, funding, institutional changes, etc). This is 2022. Act now on the NACP.

SDG is only one example. There are many other important points mentioned in the NACP. Again, let the rakyat not be deceived. 

The NACP ends in 2023. Shouldn’t the political party coalitions say something about the NACP and what is next after 2023? The rakyat are watching.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.