AMMAN — The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) on Saturday said it will reveal a “new” corruption case in the next few days.
“This case is different in nature and will prove the need to have an entity like the ACC,” ACC President Samih Bino said in a lecture at the Amman Chamber of Industry on Saturday.
He did not elaborate further.
Bino was addressing a group of officials, MPs and intellectuals over the progress in the fight against corruption.
He was one of the speakers at the Jordan Transparency Association’s one day event to look into the decline in the Kingdom’s ranking on the Transparency International Corruption Perception Index (CPI).
According to the index, the Kingdom scored 45 points on the CPI 2013, compared with 48 in 2012, and ranked 66 among the 177 countries surveyed, compared with 58 last year.
One of the CPI’s main outcomes was that Jordan’s public sector was perceived to be more corrupt in 2013 than in 2012.
Meanwhile, the Lower House is still looking into 12 draft amendments to the ACC Law that seek to enable the commission to further enhance its jurisdiction and tools to uncover corruption cases.
The new law will help the commission adopt preventive measures against potential corruption cases.
However, the commission has been complaining about its low budget in the past few years, citing this as a major obstacle facing its operations.
The ACC is understaffed, according to previous remarks by Bino, who said it needs to attract competent employees to carry out its duties in a proper manner.
The commission is investigating almost 650 cases of alleged corruption, but it does not have enough funds to protect witnesses and informants.
The ACC was established in 2006 by a Royal Decree to strengthen confidence in state institutions and provide justice and fairness for all citizens.
