Vietnam reforms laws to fight corruption in business
7/10/17
The
Party and the State have exerted great anti-corruption efforts. It has been
affirmed through many reforms on legal framework.
Mechanism for corruption-related
asset recovery strengthened
There
remained shortcomings in the process of corruption-related asset recovery and
the number of corruption cases detected and handled remained negligible.
Current regulations on declaration and control of personal assets remained
inappropriate and ineffective and lacked a mechanism for handling officials
whose additionally acquired personal assets have no clear origin and are untruthfully
declared.
To improve effectiveness of the corruption-related asset recovery, participants
suggested issuing more specific procedures for recovery, adding measures of
freezing bank accounts of corrupt officials as soon as their violations are
detected through inspection or audit, and applying more judicial remedies in
the handling of corruption cases.
Legal framework on anti-corruption
responsibility of businesses in Vietnam
Enterprises,
business associations and professional associations play a very important role
in anti-corruption work. These entities frequently use public services, and
they may influence the “health” of the economy. Over the past few years,
enterprises have not only been the “victims” of corruption, power abuse and
harassment caused by persons with higher positions and/or power, but also the
“cause” of corruption. Many enterprises seek to give bribes to public cadres
and civil servants in order to obtain certain business or profit making
advantages.
According to the Report on Provincial Competitiveness Index, the number of
enterprises that paid unofficial charges increased over the years, from 50% in
2013 up to 64.5% in 2014 and 66% in 2015-2016. Enterprises themselves are also
exposed to potential risks of their employees committing corrupt acts, abusing
their positions and delegated powers to make personal gains or cause loss of
enterprise’s assets.
In order to effectively tackle corruption, it is necessary to have active and
proactive participation from all society actors, especially the business
community.
In
2009, the Government issued a National Strategy on Anti-corruption till 2020.
One of solutions which have been pointed out in this Strategy is: “Promoting
the role of businesses and business associations in the fight against
corruption through building and practicing a fair and non-corrupt business
culture, and coordinating with competent state agencies to prevent and detect
corrupt acts of officials.”
The role and responsibilities of businesses in anti-corruption work are
specified in Article 87 of the Anti-Corruption Law (amended in 2007 and 2012)
(AC Law) and Chapter IV of Decree 47/2007/ND-CP guiding a number of provisions
of the AC Law on the role and responsibilities of businesses in anti-corruption
work (Decree 47). Accordingly, enterprises, business associations and
professional associations bear the following responsibilities:
Communicate
and encourage enterprise managing staff and employees, members of business and
professional associations to implement the AC Law. In addition, associations
are responsible for motivating and encouraging their members to build a fair
and non-corrupt business culture, to develop and implement a code of conduct to
prevent corruption.
Take
measures to prevent and detect corruption;
Encourage
denunciation of corrupt acts, report to and coordinate with state authorities
in the settlement of cases of potential corruption.
Make
recommendations for improvement of the policies and laws against corruption.
Overall,
the current regulations mainly focus on responsibilities of enterprises. There
is a lack of policies and mechanisms to emphasize the important role of
enterprises and encourage them to proactively join in anti-corruption work./.
All comments [ 5 ]
Corruption-related asset recovery was one of the most important solutions to remedy harmful consequences caused by corrupt acts to the society, need to be stopped!
The government has done all things they can to counter corruption, people should cooperate with the authorities in this fight.
Viva Vietnam, like Trinh Xuan Thanh, no one could escape!
Need to strictly punish corrupted officals who violate laws. It's justice and fair for the people.
I believe all corrupt officials will be handled, they have caused serious damages to the national interests.
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