Parliament approves amendments to ACA law

CAIRO – 10 October 2017: The parliament approvedby majorityon Tuesday the bill amending the Administrative Control Authority (ACA) law. The amendments were submitted by the government to the parliament, wheretheywerethoroughly discussed on Monday.

The approved amendments included transferring the subordination of the ACA to the president, appointing the head of the ACA by the president, following the parliament’s approval, and recognizing the authority as a state body with technical, financial and administrative independence.

ACA serves as a comprehensive anti-corruption law. It defines the concept of, and factors leading to corruption from the Egyptian perspective as “the behavior or attitude exercised by any official, by which the official may violate the ethical measures and codes of conduct, resulting in organizational, behavioral, and financial contravention. The penalties for such contravention may vary from disciplinary punishment to criminal penalties.”

Moreover, the amendments introduced the creation of several bodies to fight and prevent corruption including creating a specialized national academy. The academy aims to enhancethe capacity of the ACA staff in the area of preventing corruption in cooperation with specialized international anti-corruption bodies.

The ACA law also serves as a vital mean ofenhancing the implementation of existing legislations and ensuring proper coordination among relevant institutions playing a role in fighting corruption cohesively, without confusion and overlapping responsibilities.

The ACA is a supreme control authority in Egypt that fights various forms of corruption among the state’s institutions and public servants through internal control elements.

It comprises of several units that are responsible for; studying the causes of negligence in work, following-up on regulations and systems, revealing the defects in the administrative, technical, and financial systems, preventing crimes on duties and tendencies to abuse authority, examining media coverage of issues revealing misconduct in public services, seizing public fund crimes committed by public employees, examining complaints received from citizens or concerned authorities, investigating illegal gain cases, conducting investigations on candidates for top management posts, providing reports to relevant authorities and conducting any required studies.