On March 18, the rubber has hit the road – an offshore vessel company, Pristine Offshore Sdn Bhd and its director were the first to be charged under Section 17A of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Act 2009 since its enforcement on 1 June 2020. A former director of the company had allegedly bribed an intermediary party, Deleum Primera Sdn Bhd with RM321,350 between June 29 and October 14 last year to secure a subcontract from Petronas Carigali Sdn Bhd. Anti-corruption advocates, bystanders and then some are coveting to see if Pristine Offshore could prove in court that it had undertaken adequate procedures to prevent its own employees or directors ie. associated persons as per Section 17A (6), from committing the offence, and if it did, how will the court read into the adequacy of its anti-bribery & anti-corruption (ABC) measures.
Meanwhile, another hot potato kind of news centre around the current Inspector-General of Police’s swan song revelation of corruption inside the police force and right up to retired officers. Police are rived between their loyalty to the constitution to protect the people and a spectre within that has a stronghold on their `financial welfare’. It seems that a cartel of mobs, money launderers and other criminals have been embedded with the police. Crimes by well-connected cartel members were `unseen’ for a long time. Ironically, the IGP wants to deny independent investigations that could be conducted by a Royal Commission of Inquiry or the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission, instead promises to take actions against 34 or so police officers for their involvement with the cartel. The MACC chief echoes the IGP’s sentiment by asserting that MACC will not `interfere with the police’s internal affairs’.
Suggestively so, contrasting both these depictions, it is easier to bring down commercial organisations than the agencies of government for corruption. (It is still a win in the eyes of anti-corruption communities.) For this reason alone, are commercial organisations still in the market to test the waters of the anti-corruption law? Not adopting an ABC compliance management system in the organisation is not illegal per se. Corruption is. The law wants commercial organisations to account for misdoings that happened under their noses, even if they did not commit them. Ignoring suspicious business conducts is simply careless - punishment for that could be avoided if only business owners would have the gumption to mandate the establishment of adequate ABC procedures. The lesser the commercial organisations try to skirt the law (habitual?) or second-guess lawmakers actually taking a shot at their business operations (short-sighted?), the better off they are using available resources to prime themselves before facing a possible corporate liability one day.
One by one, agencies of government and a handful of well-managed GLCs (state-owned corporations) are publicly renewing or taking on the pledge to fight corruption. It is more economical to spend money on a sound ethics and compliance program than bribing these fellas’ with luxury cars and all-paid holidays in the long term. They are likely to say NO to such heavy-handed generosity.
See, dignity and fine integrity are not antiquated.
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