BackThe Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission (ACRC) of the Republic of Korea launched a training course to share its anti-corruption policies and experiences with African countries.
The training course was organized online for three days from March 28 by the Anti-Corruption Training Institute of the ACRC. It brought together 54 participants from the Ministry for the Promotion of Good Governance and the Fight against Corruption of Côte d'Ivoire; the Ministry of the Promotion of Good Governance and the Fight against Corruption and the National Commission to Combat Illicit Enrichment of Gabon; Independent Bureau of Anti-Corruption (BIANCO) of Madagascar; and National Office against Fraud and Corruption (OFNAC) of Senegal.
Provided in the French language, the course covered Korea’s major anti-corruption measures including Integrity Assessment, Corruption Risk Assessment and whistleblower protection and reward program, which have earned international recognition as best practices in the anti-corruption field.
The capacity building program also dealt with international anti-corruption instruments such as the United Nations Convention against Corruption and the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention, as well as Korea's domestic legislation including the Act on the Prevention of Conflicts of Interest of Public Officials, the Improper Solicitation and Graft Act, and the Act on Prohibition of False Claims for Public Funds and Recovery of Illicit Profits.
The ACRC has run the ACRC Training Course for International Anti-Corruption Practitioners every year since 2013 for public officials from anti-corruption agencies around the world.
In response to a steady increase in the need for its anti-corruption training, the ACRC developed a new training course conducted in the Russian language for countries in Eastern Europe and Central Asia in 2020 and another conducted in French for countries in Africa this year in addition to its annual courses in English.
To date, the ACRC's multinational training course was attended by a total of 67 countries, producing substantial outcomes in 61 cases including adoption of Integrity Assessment, improvement of whistleblower protection measures, and enactment or amendment of anti-corruption legislation in the participating countries.
Korea's various and systematic anti-corruption education programs were also noted in the G20 Compendium of Good Practices on Public Participation and Anti-Corruption Education adopted at the G20 Bali summit last November.
Citing the Korean government's announcement last month that Korea will increase its annual budget for official development assistance for African nations to 1 trillion won by 2030, Jeon Hyun-heui, Chairperson of the ACRC, said "the ACRC will continue to expand its support for countries in Africa to achieve sustainable development by helping enhance their anti-corruption capacity."
Source: Anti-Corruption & Civil Rights Commission, ACRC
