TI-Malaysia Lauds MACC for first case of Corporate Liability
Transparency International Malaysia is very pleased to take note of MACC’s first case against a company under the Corporate Liability Section 17A of the MACC Act 2009 yesterday at the Shah Alam Session Court.
President Muhammad Mohan said, this has come about after a mere 9 months since the enforcement date of Section 17A in June 2020. In the UK when the equivalent UK Bribery Act 2010 was enforced in 2011, the first conviction only came 5 years later. This will certainly be a first test case for this new provision of Corporate Liability and it will be interesting to see how the company will defend itself in court with ‘Adequate Procedures” if it had implemented.
Since Section 17A came into force and before even, Transparency International Malaysia and MACC have been advocating to commercial organizations throughout the country on the urgency for compliance of this s provision. In fact some companies have adopted the Ministerial Guidelines provided on adequate procedures and have put in place controls for good governance to prevent corruption. However many companies are still adopting the “wait and see” attitude.
It is also a known fact that the cause of the corruption in the public sector is due to bribes given mostly by the private sector. This Corporate Liability provision thus works well to address this problem because if a similar case happened with a public officer receiving a bribe, the company will face a similar case in court.
Certainly our judiciary system will ensure a fair trial in this first case, however if found guilty it is hoped that stern punishment is given to send a clear message to corporate Malaysia that the bribing culture to do business in the private sector must stop.
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Note to Editors: For clarification on any and all official statements from Transparency International – Malaysia (TI-M), kindly refer to its President, Dr Muhammad Mohan (mmohan@transparency.org.my)
