Big fish still off anti-graft radar

Charging the wrong person, bribe scam involving its own official, going soft on the influential corrupt people, and graft charges against political leaders and government officials kept the Anti-Corruption Commission a hot topic in 2019.

As the year began, the ACC came under fire for its mistake in identifying a corruption case accused that led to jute-mill worker Jahalam to suffer three years in prison. 

By mid-2019, the commission was again in the soup as one of its directors taking bribe came to the fore.

In July, the ACC sued its director Khandaker Enamul Basir, now suspended, for taking Tk 40 lakh bribe from suspended deputy inspector general of police Mizanur Rahman.

Mizan brought the allegation against Basir and had said he bribed Basir so that he be let off graft allegations against him.

However, the government’s drive against illegal casino operators gave the ACC a chance to recover its image. 

The anti-graft watchdog also filed 17 cases against a businessman, government officials, and controversial leaders of different fronts of the ruling party and their family members for illegally acquiring wealth worth about Tk 446 crore.

It also froze about Tk 362 crore in different bank accounts and wealth worth about Tk 78 crore.

The Tk 446 crore is ironically almost the exact number Bangladesh Jute Mills Corporation asked from the government last year to buy raw jute so that it could continue production in full swing. It got only around Tk 80 crore and had to cut production.

Following the anti-casino drives, ACC Chairman Iqbal Mahmood on several occasions hinted at investigating the illegal wealth of about 187 people, including some ruling party lawmakers and influential corrupt people. He said they had made a list.

The commission wrote to Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau of Singapore asking for information on individuals who gambled at the country’s casinos in the last five years.

The ACC also sought banking information of over 150 people from Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit.

Some ruling party lawmakers – Shamsul Hoque Chowdhury, Pankaj Debnath and Nurunnabi Chowhdury Shaon – are on the list.

However, no cases have been filed against the lawmakers. 

A source at the commission said, “We’re progressing cautiously. We’re scrutinising and verifying information before taking any step against the lawmakers.”

ENQUIRY INTO HOSPITAL PROCUREMENT ANOMALIES

This year the anti-graft watchdog also launched extensive enquiry into procurement anomalies at different hospitals across the country.

In 2019, the ACC filed about nine cases against doctors and contractors for misappropriating around Tk 52 crore during procurement of machines and medicines for Azimpur Maternity Hospital, Chattogram General Hospital, Rangpur Medical College Hospital, Satkhira Sadar Hospital, and Faridpur Medical College Hospital.

A total of 58 people, including hospital superintendents, civil surgeons, and contractors, were implicated in these cases.

In a unique move, the commission in December asked the cabinet to blacklist 13 medical equipment suppliers for their alleged involvement in the misappropriation.

HOTLINE 

Launched on July 27, 2017, the ACC’s hotline service “106” is gradually becoming popular, and received around 36 lakh calls until November this year, said ACC officials.

According to the ACC, they conducted a total of 890 drives in 2019 based on these calls and sent 825 letters to different government offices for taking necessary measures.

Following enquiry into allegations made through the hotline, ACC officials filed cases as well.

For instance, on December 10, the ACC filed a case against a couple for embezzling about Tk 4.97 crore from a bank account by forging signature.

CAUGHT RED HANDED

The number of cases in which government officials were caught taking bribes increased this year despite the ACC chairman’s warning that the ACC would be tough on such people. 

In 2018, the ACC filed 15 cases after catching government officials in the act. As of December 5 of this year, the number of these cases is 22.

Compared to that of last year, the number of cases filed and charge sheets submitted by the ACC increased to 319 and 298 from 216 and 236.

Transparency International Bangladesh Executive Director Iftekharuzzaman said while the commission has indeed been proactive in taking actions against relatively low- and mid-level public officials, it has yet to show concrete results in terms of holding to account the influential corrupt people.

“Kingpins of some of the much talked about financial and banking sector scams, like the Basic Bank scam, have remained off the hook,” he added.

On the handling of the corruption allegations regarding the casino and procurement lords, he said it remains to be seen if the actions taken by the ACC would be deep and robust enough to include godfathers.

Pointing out some of the commission’s weakness, he related how the gross injustice done to Jahalam in the hands of the ACC had adversely affected its reputation, casting doubt about the credibility of its investigation process. 

“The ACC has struggled throughout the year to manage allegations of investigative inefficiency and corruption of a sizable number of its own officials including a very senior ACC official caught in illegal transaction against whom actions had to be taken,” he said.

The ACC Commissioner Mozammel Haque Khan, however, stated that these mistakes would help the ACC to rectify and prevent repetition in future.

In reply to questions about action taken against financial sector kingpins, Mozammel said, “It’s not true that we are not catching the big fish. We’ve caught MDs [managing director] and DMDs [deputy managing director] in different corruption cases.”