'Transparent society, Trusted government, Happy people'

Report of ACRC's Work Plan for 2018

January 26, 2018

Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission

The Republic of Korea

The Anti-Corruption & Civil Rights Commission (ACRC) reported its work plan for the year 2018 to the Prime Minister on January 25 at 14:00 at Government Complex in Seoul, along with other six public agencies including the Ministry of Justice, the National Police Agency, and Fair Trade Commission.

According to the result of survey in 2016, while the scale of Korea's gross domestic production (GDP) is the 11th largest in the world, its Corruption Perceptions Index in the year stayed only at the 52nd place, which was nine notches lower than the index in the previous year.

In such policy circumstances, the ACRC has selected core policies for this year and will put focus on them in its policy implementation. The core policies include: ① enhancement of national integrity level by pushing forward with comprehensive anti-corruption and integrity policies; ② recovery of people's trust in government by encouraging their participation in policies and reinforcing communication with them; and ③ improvement of the quality of life by practically protecting people's rights.

1. Push forward with Comprehensive Anti-Corruption and Integrity Policies

｢Moon Jae-in Administration's Five-Year Comprehensive Anti-Corruption Plan｣ that is satisfactory from the perspective of people will be established and implemented.

Ten key areas of policy implementation including amelioration of fields susceptible to corruption will be selected and ideas will be collected from all levels of society both on-line and off-line, to draw up the final plan by March.

For the purpose of drastically eradicate corrupt practices in the private sector, different institutions will implement each of their own key improvement tasks such as eradication of illegal rebates and enhancement of accounting transparency. In addition, the ACRC will focus on the detection of corrupt acts and public interest violations including price-fixing and unfair overuse of power.

Notably, a center for reporting of fraudulent claims of government subsidies will be operated, in order to prevent waste of taxpayers' precious money.

Sanctions against corrupt acts, including restriction on bidding for public projects and punitive damages, will be expanded. Establishment of the system for prevention of corruption at private businesses will be actively supported.

National image of integrity will be improved both in and out of the country.

The areas of rampant corruption such as employment irregularities that have emerged as a hot issue recently will be included in the subject of integrity assessment. Also, implementation of the code of conduct by organizations subject to the integrity assessment will be more thoroughly inspected.

Details of violation of the Improper Solicitation and Graft Act and the Code of Conduct for Public Officials will be announced to the media. An integrity map that visualizes the result of integrity assessment will be developed and distributed, in order to arouse local governments' attention.

※ Detailed information (integrity score and grade) is exposed when clicking on a specific region

※ When clicking on a specific metropolitan city government, the integrity grade of the basic municipality to which it belongs is displayed

Integrity policies applied to high-ranking public officials will be strengthened.

An analysis by the ACRC has found out the fact that a public agency whose head shows strong commitments to addressing corruption gains a higher score in the Anti-Corruption Initiative Assessment. It indicates that high-ranking public official's anti-corruption initiative is important for improving public agencies' integrity.

The system of preventing conflict of interest will be reinforced; a person, who is appointed as a high-ranking public official, will be required to disclose details of working activities for the recent three years.

A practice of refraining from illegal solicitation to a private entity such as "no solicitation for employment" will be promoted and education about ban on illegal solicitation for employment will be provided to people in charge of personnel management of companies.

Notably, acts of violating the Improper Solicitation and Graft Act will be continuously inspected, to highlight public officials' duty to abide by the law.

2. Encourage People's Participation in Policy-making and Promote Communication with People

Anti-corruption governance will be built with people.

｢Private-Public Council for Transparent Society｣ participated by all levels of society will be formed, to discuss and review the entire integrity policy process from the establishment of anti-corruption policies to their monitoring and evaluation from the perspective of people.

Transparent society agreements will be signed and proclaimed in each sector of society and each region, while voluntary integrity tasks such as "stable compliance with the "Improper Solicitation and Graft Act" will be carried out.

People will be encouraged to make policy suggestions and take part in policy discussions.

The process of transforming people's opinions into actual policy change will be reinforced based on collaboration with civil organizations and government-sponsored research institutes.

Policy ideas that are closely related with the lives of people will be collected through People's Idea Box,* and useful subjects and suggestions among them will be rewarded with "Idea Growing Prize," to encourage people's active participation in policy-making.

* A mobile-friendly participation platform operated by the ACRC (idea.epeople.go.kr)

The result of a survey on the level of people's confidence in the public offices in Korea shows that Koreans in their twenties and thirties have the biggest mistrust in public offices. In order to resolve their dissatisfaction and frustration, People's Idea Box will include a function for discussion with these generations.

More than six million "voices of people" collected from e-People* and Integrated Government Call Center 110 will be actively reflected in government policies.

* A pan-government on-line platform for people's participation, which integrates and connects the windows for civil complaints, policy suggestion, diverse reporting, and communication (www.epeople.go.kr)

A system of "Civil Complaint Signal Light" will be operated, to visually display the tendency of civil complaints in the form of traffic signal for the purpose of successfully responding to social issues or issues of large-scale public conflicts. The information of civil complaint analysis that has been shared only with administrative agencies so far will be visually displayed and provided to people.

Furthermore, civil complaint forecasts will be issued in a timely manner, by keeping track of negative key-words in civil complaints such as danger and accident, in order to detect likelihood of such civil complaints preemptively.

"365-Day Safety Hazard Control Project" will be implemented.

The ACRC will focus on its functions on the four key areas of traffic, construction, fire-fighting, and food closely related with the safety of people, and continue to remove hazards for people's safety in their daily lives for 365 days a year.

The upper limit for the compensation money granted for whistle-blowing will be raised from two billion won to three billion won, in order to encourage whistle-blowing against safety hazards. The ACRC will reinforce payment of prize money for exemplary cases and relief fund for whistle-blowers, while pushing ahead with active indemnification of whistle-blowers.

Issues that need amelioration for the safety of people in their daily lives will be found out from People's Idea Box, while safety-related requirements of people will be identified in a timely manner by conducting big-data analysis.

Furthermore, the cause of frequent safety accidents and spots vulnerable to accidents will be checked and dealt with by conducting on-site inspections, to put more efforts to protect people who are vulnerable to safety accidents.

3. Practical Protection of People's Rights

The focus will be put on the resolution of socially disadvantaged people's grievances.

In order to actively resolve grievances of those who are exposed to unfavorable residential environment, as well as low-income people, civil complaints about forced eviction from public rental houses will be handled in priority, and complaints about seizure of the minimum cost of living for low-income people will be specially managed.

Civil complaints related with immigration of foreign workers in Korea will be resolved in cooperation with "Support Center for Foreign Workers."

Difficulties related with jobs will be actively resolved.

Industrial complexes and agricultural industrial complexes across the nation will be visited in order to directly resolve the difficulties of small-and-medium-sized companies on-site jointly with the competent local government and relevant public agencies.

As passive performance of public officials' duties such as insincere or indifferent working attitude can be regarded as a kind of corruption, it will be dealt with from a holistic perspective encompassing handling of grievances, prevention of corruption, and improvement of institutions.

In addition, civil complaints that are frequently raised by venture and small-and-medium-sized companies will be analyzed in-depth, to establish institutional improvement measures.

Blind spot in remedy of people's rights will be minimized.

Visits to small islands and remote areas will be expanded, and on-site counseling will be offered in eup and myeon (small county and town) areas that are not easy to visit due to poor transportation conditions.

Establishment of local ombudsman will be supported, in order to build a tighter network for remedy of people's rights.

In addition, introduction of financial ombudsman will be promoted to help ordinary people who are suffering from grievances related with the financial sector including bank and insurance, for the purpose of actively resolving finance-related grievances.

Mediation for large-scale class-action complaints will be reinforced.

A civil complaint that is related with more than 1,000 people or costs more than 10 billion won will be dealt with primarily by a special investigation team. Complaints related with multiple government departments will be discussed at "State Affair Review and Coordination Council" and others, to explore solutions.

This year, ownerless real estates beyond the civilian control line recaptured during the Korean War will be newly organized, in order to resolve complaints of the local residents of Haean-myeon in Yanggu-gun, to finally complete the real estate project long awaited by the local people.

The ACRC will make greater efforts to carry out the policies to fight against corruption and promote people's rights in the year 2018, to realize the slogan of "more transparent society, more trusted government, and happier people."