One year into the enactment of the Improper Solicitation and Graft Act, large number of self-reported violations of the act by public officials indicate a strong will to comply with the act

Out of the 620 reports of graft violations, self-reported violations by public officials outnumbered reports of a third party’s violations. “The Act will resolve blind spot in the Criminal Act in fighting corruption, and the Act’s joint penal provision for businesses is very effective.”, the ACRC said

September 28, 2017

Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission

The Republic of Korea

For the 10 months since the enactment of the Improper Solicitation and Graft Act, a total of 4,052 violations of the law were reported. Especially worth noting is that among the 620 reports of grafts, self-reported violations by public officials doubled violations made by a third-party, suggesting a strong will to comply with the law in the public sector.

Marking one year of the enactment of the Improper Solicitation and Graft Act on September 28, 2016, the Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission (ACRC, Chairperson Pak Un Jong) conducted a survey of 23,874 public organizations throughout the nation on the status of receipt and handling of violation reports of the law and how they have operated education on the law. The ACRC announced on July 2nd that the survey results showed that as of July 2017, a total of 4,052 violations of the law were reported.

By types of violations, there were 242 cases of improper solicitations, 620 cases of grafts, and 3,190 cases of outside lectures and other violations. Among them, 88 cases and 185 violators were reported to courts by the reporting organization for imposition of administrative fines, and 33 cases and 122 violators were reported to investigative agencies for investigation.

Out of the 620 reports of receiving or giving grafts, 64.7%, or 401 reports, were self reported by public officials which was almost twice larger than the third party reports which was 64.7%, or 401 reports.

Types and value of the self-reported monetary gifts were varied from 20 million won(about 1700$) cash and 10 million won(about 9000$) bank note to 9,600 won(about 8$) worth of snacks. Regardless of its value, the fact that such reported monetary gifts were returned and reported voluntarily shows public officials’ enhanced level of integrity and ethics and their a strong will of compliance with the law.

It is expected that thanks to self reporting, more of the corruptions that would otherwise be hidden will be covered. Furthermore, by promoting self-reporting, the public sector is expected to gain more trust from the public.

The Improper Solicitation and Graft Act mandates public institutions (23,874) to provide trainings on the Act to their employees more than once a year. The survey results showed that a total of 98,017 such trainings, or 4.1 trainings per institution on average, were provided.

Central administrative agencies provided an average of 98.9 training sessions, much higher than public service-related institutions (7.3 sessions on average) and schools and school foundations (3.6 sessions on average).

Training on the Improper Solicitation and Graft Act serves not only to enhance the understanding of the Act, but also to motivate public officials to stay more sensitive to integrity and ethics, which then would ultimately lead them to voluntarily report grafts they received or to refuse any improper solicitation.

As such, training on the Act has significantly contributed to the law’s stable enforcement in our society, the ACRC said.

On a total of 121 cases and 401 violators, requests for investigation were made to investigative agencies, or acts of violation subject to administrative fines were reported to courts.

Among them, 29 cases (46 violators) faced administrative fines, and 11 cases (46 violators) were indicted (opinions of indictment delivered) or faced punishments.

As for the cases facing punishments, an employee of a public service-related organization faced criminal punishment of a 5 million fine (about4300$) for receiving 2 million won(about 1700$) from an employee of a subcontract company. In another case, a chief of a fire station was slapped with an administrative fine of 10 million won(about 8700$) for ordering his subordinate to overlook a company’s illegal act. It was the largest amount of the administrative fines imposed for the violation of the Act so far.

As for judicial precedents, in the cases requiring high level of fairness and integrity, such as investigation, examination, inspection, or adjudication, even if the amount of the received monetary benefits was small, strong punishments were imposed on violators with an administrative fine of two to four times of the received amount.

Moreover, there have been growing voluntary efforts by public organizations to control their employees who violated the law thorough means like imposing them on fines as a disciplinary measure before a court’s decision was made.

Meanwhile, the Act regulates corruptions that are not restricted by the current Criminal Act, which is a legal blind spot. In other words, the Act prohibits an act of asking an improper favor even though no money or benefit was provided. The Act also criminalizes giving or receiving monetary benefits which was impossible to be punished under the Criminal Act because it is difficult to prove the link between the benefits and favors provided.

So in future cases where it is difficult to prove such link, the Act will serve as an effective legal tool to punish the violators.

In addition, if heads and employees of a company committed a violation of the Act, both the violators and the company will be subject to punishments under the Act’s joint penal provision. In that case, no matter how small the imposed administrative fine is, the company will suffer severe damage to its brand image.

However, unless the company had not taken enough attention or monitoring efforts to prevent its employees from violating the law, it will be exempted from punishments. Therefore, going forward more companies will pay more attention on integrity and ethics education for their heads and employees.

An official from the ACRC said, “September 28 marks one year anniversary of the Improper Solicitation and Graft Act which was enacted amid a strong public desire and aspiration for a fair and transparent nation. The Act’s effect of preventing corruptions is being felt especially in areas of handling administrative affairs closely linked to people’s every-day lives. For instance, in those areas, duty-related improper solicitations and personal contacts have decreased while more public officials are now performing their duties more uprightly.”

He added, “The improper Solicitation and Graft Act is the result of legislative procedure having gone through numerous opinion gatherings and discussions based on a strong public support and aspiration for a fair and transparent nation. The ACRC hopes to have continued public support and encouragement for the successful development of the Act to achieve its intended objective and satisfy the public demand and expectation."

【Attachment】Statics of reports of violation of the Improper Solicitation and Graft Act and how they were handled

<Statistics of submitted and handled reports of violation of the Act>

* Delay or failure of reporting outside lectures is not subject to the request for imposition of administrative fines or investigation. Only receiving honoraria exceeding the acceptable amount is subject to administrative fines

* The data was collected in cooperation with public organizations, and some of data might be redundant or omitted.