Om Yentieng who is the Head of the Anticorruption Unit said Wednesday at the Council of Ministers that the long-awaited anticorruption law will be approved soon after the Nation reconvenes on April 01.

On December 11, 2009, the Council of Ministers had approved the draft anti-graft law which consists of 57 articles aiming at preventing corruption, punishing corrupt activities and fostering public participation in efforts to eradicate graft in Cambodia.

The Phnom Penh Post quoted Om Yentieng as saying that “NGOs and foreign experts [have been] deeply involved in the issue and now it is time for the government to put its hand into the process to combat corruption.”

He said 62 members of the government’s Anticorruption Unit were taking part in the three-day training programme to learn how to design an anticorruption survey, and that three further training programmes, run by NGO Pact Cambodia with financial assistance from the US Agency for International Development (USAID), were scheduled between April and June this year.

According to Transparency International’s corruption index, Cambodia ranks no. 158 out of 180 countries, putting it ahead of only Burma and Laos in the region.

In addition, the new version of draft anti-corruption also requires all civil servants and NGO workers to disclose the extent of their personal assets within 60 days of passing into law.

Flynn Fuller, mission director of USAID, said that “we know that the Anticorruption law has been passed by the Council of Ministers and will go to the National Assembly for approval. It is expected that law will meet international standards and will be formally activated this year,” reported the Post.

Cheam Yeap, senior lawmaker from the ruling Cambodian People’s Party, said that the National Assembly has not yet received the draft law on anticorruption from the Council of Ministers, but that he hoped the law would be passed by the end of June this year, according to the Post.

“If we cannot have access to information in public and government institutions, especially involving corrupt officials in the government, we cannot effectively fight corruption…and the law we are making now will become just a blank paper,” Yim Sovann, SRP’s member, was quoted by the VOA Khmer as saying.

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