Ministry official prosecuted over corruption charges

KUWAIT: The Public Anti-Corruption Authority (Nazaha) referred an assistant undersecretary at the ministry of services and others to the public prosecution for involvement in corruption, the authority’s official spokesperson Dr Mohammed Abdul Rahman Bu Zobar announced yesterday. Nazaha added that Minister of State for Services Jenan Bushehri had reported suspicions of corruption after forming a special committee to conduct an inventory on postal stamps that found stamps worth KD 1,236,316 were missing, before referring the matter to Nazaha for investigations.

Corruption charges In collaboration with the Ministry of Commerce and Industry (MoCI), the Ministry of Social Affairs and Labor (MSAL) closed a subsidized goods outlet at a Mubarak Al-Kabeer Co-op Society branch after the outlet’s manager was found involved in corruption, said informed sources, noting that both the manager and other involved suspects were referred to the public prosecution for further investigations. The source explained that the suspects had been regularly selling subsidized goods remaining in the outlet after giving citizens’ rations and splitting the money.

Salary increments

The government will not look into recent parliamentary demands for salary increments for public sector employees as it deems such demands unjustified in view of the state budget imbalances and unstable oil prices, well-informed sources said. “Salary increments will not be made according to traditional methods because the government wants to solve the problem in view of the reports made by IMF and the World Bank demanding salary cuts to promote productivity,” the sources said. They noted that the government may tackle the salary issue if lawmakers approve the strategic payroll alternative bill, which is stuck after its rejection by the oil sector.

Fake degrees Deputy Foreign Minister Khaled AlJarallah said the foreign ministry submitted an inquiry to the ministry of higher education about a list of universities abroad from which some of the ministry employees had degrees. Jarallah added that the inquiry involved the validity of those degrees and accreditation of the concerned universities, and stressed that the ministry will never tolerate having employees with fake degrees and hold them accountable.

Electricity projects

The Ministry of Electricity and Water (MEW) is currently executing a number of projects to deal with rising electricity and water consumption resulting from urban expansion, said informed sources. The sources added that MEW is collaborating with the Kuwait Authority for Partnership Projects to execute two projects in Zour and Khairan to produce a total of 16,000 megawatts of electricity.