KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 27 — National Oversight and Whistleblowers (NOW) has offered its help today in developing Malaysian’s own corruption index, following a proposal by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) last week.
The PKR-linked group said it has the experience in tackling graft, especially its founder Rafizi Ramli who was sentenced to prison over the National Feedlot Corporation case.
“If MACC still wants to start a National Corruption Index, NOW is ready to be an independent body to implement it,” its director Akmal Nasir said in a statement.
NOW said MACC has done a good job in increasing public awareness when it comes to corruption, but is still lacking in some aspects, such as protecting whistleblowers.
“To increase public trust in graftbusting, an offender must go through the justice process and punishment, no matter what his political background or status,” he said.
Last week, MACC said it plans to create a more effective special corruption index to analyse and measure the level of corruption in the country.
MACC Chief Commissioner Tan Sri Dzulkifli Ahmad said if the proposal was approved, a study would be carried out by an independent body as well as academicians to ensure the transparency of the index.
This comes as Malaysia fell seven places in Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index 2017.
