ACRC Says, “Dismissal at Request Is Not Allowed for Executives in Public Offices When They are Involved in Misconducts”

- The ACRC carried out Corruption Risk Assessment on 1,569 bylaws of 13 public organizations in national land and safety sectors, and made 98 recommendations -

(25th Aug. 2021, ACRC)

In the future, executives in public organizations cannot be dismissed at their request if they are prosecuted or under investigation or inquiry in relation to their misconducts.

The Anti-Corruption & Civil Rights Commission (Chairperson: Jeon Hyun-Heui, ACRC) conducted corruption risk assessment on 1,569 bylaws of 13 public organizations in national land and safety sectors, including Korea National Railway and the Road Traffic Authority, and provided organizations with 98 recommendations and 22 tasks in 3 categories.

According to the corruption risk assessment, ACRC found that some organizations did not have regulations that prevent dismissal of executives at their request when they are involved in misconduct, while they do not allow dismissal of non-executive members at their request.

Also, there were organizations that did not have rules restricting the employment of those who mandatorily retired, is dismissed or discharged from other offices for committing misconduct.

Also, there were organizations that operate budget execution standards arbitrarily by having exceptional expenditure provisions to allow them to determine separate expenditure criteria and means. Other organizations did not have regulations for exclusion, recusal and refrainment of members in operating investment and funding deliberation committees responsible for feasibility review of new projects.

So, the ACRC recommended the organizations to limit dismissal at request of executives who are involved in misconduct, and include dismissal for misconduct in the grounds for disqualification of employment.

In addition, it had them improve arbitrary budget execution standards, such as exceptional expenditure provisions, and come up with a mechanism for preventing conflict of interests, so that members in investment and funding deliberation council who have special interests cannot participate in the deliberation process.

Besides, the commission recommended public organizations to create criteria for disciplinary measures for DUI as strict as the disciplinary criteria for public officials to strengthen the punishment of executives and staff members for DUI.

It also made recommendations for public corporations for improving bylaws to prevent preferential private contract by banning the organizations from signing private contract for two years with any companies that hired former employees of public organizations for executive positions, and requiring organizations to open all private contracts to their website.

The ACRC has carried out full inspection of bylaws for 495 public organizations since last year. It reviewed bylaws of 187 organizations in 7 sectors, such as energy, airport and port, and made 1,971 recommendations for improvement last year. This year, it plans to complete the review of bylaws of 99 organizations in 7 sectors, starting with 20 public organizations in the labor and welfare sectors.

Director General Han Sam-Seok for Anti-Corruption Bureau said, “the ACRC will continue its efforts to make fair and transparent society by actively identifying and improving elements causing corruption, such as conflict of interests and excessive use of discretionary power, in the bylaws of public organizations.”

□ Overview

○ A preventive corruption control mechanism that analyzes corruption risk factors in a systematic manner from the drafting stage of statutes and systems and eliminates and improves them in advance.

* (Legal basis) Article 28 of the Act on the Prevention of Corruption and the Establishment and Management of the Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission, Article 30-32 of the Enforcement Decree of such law

□ Assessment subjects

○ Legislation, administrative rules, local statutes, internal rules of public institutes (bylaws, etc.)

* With the revision of the ACRC Act in Oct. 2019, the ACRC can assess internal regulations of public offices with its own authority.

□ Assessment criteria

○ Assess with 12 criteria in four assessment areas – compliance, execution, administrative process, and corruption control

□ Current status of assessment

○ (Enactment and revision of laws) When administrative organizations enact and revise laws, the ACRC assesses corruption-causing factors in the laws before the review of the Ministry of Government Legislation and recommends improvement to the relevant organizations.

* In 2020, the ACRC reviewed 1,999 laws enacted or revised, and made 347 recommendations to improve 169 laws

○ (Current laws, etc.) The ACRC selects current social issues including corruption cases as main agenda, assesses corruption-causing factors in laws, regulations and systems and makes recommendations for improvement.