NGOs suggest the public’s lack of faith in graft body is the reason

ACU sees complaints drop

THE number of complaints received by the Anti-Corruption Unit almosthalvedbetween 2014 and 2016, the six-year-old institution has said in a statement, with its chairman attributing the drop in part to fewer people complaining about issues not under its purview.

But civil society groups said yesterday that the drop might instead be attributed to no one believing that the largely inactive institution will investigate the complaints it receives.

Published online on Tuesday, the ACU statement says it only received 597 formal complaints of corruption last year, down from 781 in 2015 and 1,009 in 2014. Of the total 2,387 complaints received in the past three years, 1,125 were anonymous, it said.

ACU Chairman Om Yentieng said by telephone that he believed the drop could be attributed to people not filing complaints to the body about problems like land-grabbing, for which other specialist committees have been established to resolve issues.

“It dropped because, for example, for land issues, we told people to go to the correct institutions that have the author- ity to solve their problems. It meant that people knew where to go with their problems,” Yentieng said.

“And it dropped [in total] because complaints about public services had dropped. Before, there were a lot of complaints CONTINUED

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