Abdullah Al-Ghamdi
Okaz/Saudi Gazette
RIYADH — The National Anti-Corruption Commission (Nazaha) will soon issue new rules and regulations to incriminate people who amass wealth through illegal means and also to protect the informers about corruption, its chairman Khaled Bin Abdul Mohsen Al-Muhaisen has said.
He told Okaz/Saudi Gazette in an exclusive interview with Okaz/Saudi Gazette, Al-Muhaisen said the law to incriminate people who become rich illegally is part of the projects Nazaha is implementing to protect public funds.
“We are drafting these laws as part of the UN Convention against Corruption which asks all countries to codify national laws to combat corruption in order to protect public wealth,” he said.
Al-Muhaisen said the laws, which have already been forwarded to the higher authorities, will be submitted to the Shoura Council for final approval.
He appreciated the close cooperation of citizens with the commission in informing about corruption cases and said new rules will be made to protect the informers and witnesses.
“We are planning to boost our cooperation with the citizens so as to encourage them to immediately inform about any suspected case of corruption,” he said.
The chairman said they are closely monitoring newspapers and the social media to monitor any published suspected corruption issue.
“We have a special department to gather information from the media and to follow up the corruption cases they publish,” he said.
The chairman denied the charges that Nazaha only follows up the simple cases of corruption and is not targeting the big ones.
“This is not true. We give utmost concern to any case of corruption whether big or small. The only thing is that big cases take a long time to investigate before they are made public,” he said.
Al-Muhaisen said the commission is closely working with the Justice Ministry and other concerned departments to crack down on land sharks.
Talking about money laundry cases, the chairman said Nazaha was not involved in this area which is the sole responsibility of the Interior Ministry.
The chairman denied charges that the commission was selective in the cases it usually follows up and said for it nobody is above the law.
He did not have a statistical data on the number of the corruption cases currently being investigated but said some decline has been noticed.
He also did not have an exact figure about the amount of money paid to the informers but said the reward is estimated according to the size and importance of each case.
