SHARING KNOWLEDGEASIA PACIFIC REGIONAL PROGRAMME MEETING SPECIAL EDITION - 20TH MAY 2014 - ISSUE 01

Asia Pacific Regional Meeting of Transparency International kicked off in Kathmandu on May 19, 2013.

More than 60 people representing the TI movement in the Asia Pacific region gathered in Kathmandu’s Soaltee Crowne Plaza for the opening ceremony.

On his inaugural speech Dr Devendra Pandey, former President of TI Nepal and civil movement leader, lauded the work done by ALACS.

“I have been told one hundred and forty thousand victims and witnesses across the world got legal advice and facilitation from possible corruption,” Dr Pandey said.

“This is not a big number. But it should be increased with gradual realization of more outcomes that we will see as we move along.”

Dr Pandey also suggested Chapters in emerging democracies to widen its coalition to include diverse sectors of society, work at grassroots by being more inclusive and not to shy away from the engagement with the political parties.

Bishu Bahadur KC, TI Nepal’s President, stressed that the new constitution should ensure the issues to address corruption in the country.“Nepal is currently going through a transitional phase. The writing of constitution puts Nepal at the turning point of history,” KC said.

“The time is appropriate to ensure that the constitution addresses issues of corruption in all sectors including politics, public service, private business, media, education, health, construction and public utility.”

In the inaugural session Dr Srirak Pilpat, regional director of TI’s Asia Pacific department, highlighted on some of the key areas related to corruption in the region.

Each year Transparency International chapters from the Asia Pacific region meet to discuss emerging corruption challenges and solutions.

ASIA PACIFIC REGIONAL MEETING KICKS OFF IN KATHMANDU

Youth/ALAC exchange led by TI Cambodia gave chapters from the region a clear understanding on ALAC start-up and implementation process and experience in the effectiveness of public outreach and advocacy.

Key learning: constructive engagement and partnership with relevant authorities can be a key factor in successful public people engagement.

CONSTRUCTIVE ENGAGEMENT AND PARTNERSHIP WITH RELEVANT AUTHORITIES CAN BE A KEY FACTOR IN SUCCESSFUL PUBLIC PEOPLE ENGAGEMENT

The ED Induction programme provided a support space for the new generation of EDs in the AP region. The Induction was a space for new and more experienced EDs to share experiences, challenges and develop personal leadership development plans.

“LEADERSHIP IS A LONELY JOB” - ABOUT THE ED INDUCTION

COLLABORATION & EXCHANGE EFFORTS WITHIN ASIA PACIFIC REGION

South Asia Exchange Programme has built a horizon to network and build partnership and cooperation well beyond the actual period of secondment.

“THE EXPERTISE IS VERY NEAR TO YOU”

TI Malaysia used the case of Business Integrity workshop in KL to demonstrate the collaborations between the TI-S and the NCs and elaborated on what worked well.

COLLABORATIONS BETWEEN TI-S AND THE NCs

TI Maldives and TI Sri Lanka presented a case of their successful joint fund-raising event in Colombo to illustrate collaboration between NCs. Beyond being competitors for the same funding resources, the two chapters worked together to submit a joint application to a donor.

COLLABORATIONS BETWEEN THE NCs

Q: What’s the situation of corruption in Cambodia?

Preap Kol: It is very bad. Ranking of the CPI put Cambodia at 160/177. It’s very systematic and rampant corruption. But the good news is that people's attitude has changed in the past few years. They no longer tolerate it and that is good news. We have more and more demand from the people to fight against corruption. Therefore, we expect more political will and commitment from the government. What makes the fight against corruption effective and possible in Cambodia?

Preap Kol: We have a team of people with strong passion to work and to improve the situation, to improve the livelihood of people, to make the country more accountable, more transparent and cleaner society in a sense that less corruption. When passionate people are coming together as team with their dynamic expertise and talents, we can reach out beyond limitations. In a short time we have been able to do so many things. We have now mobilized 7000 volunteers and members across the country who have been taking part in different initiatives and actively supporting what we do. People have been able to raise awareness among the family, friends, at schools and reaching out to their community in educating, raising awareness and getting more people to join our movement. That helps to send a message to the politicians, government, and people in the whole spectrum have now inspiration and mission to do something that will benefit the future generation.

What are the challenges in fighting against corruption in Cambodia?

Preap Kol: Fighting against corruption in a country like Cambodia is difficult and that is expected. But more and more people are joining us, it gives us motivation and encouragement, which means we are doing something right and we have been effective. Sometimes authorities and corrupt people get threatened by what we do and that is normal. This is what we consider one of our challenges. It is a risk but it does not stop us from doing our job, it encourages us to do more. That’s why we are continuing our work and even multiply in the activities that we are currently doing in the country. Every day more and more people are speaking up against corruption. In the past people were afraid to speak against corruption in my country. Recently, we have broken taboo of sensitivity. In workshops and events that we do I have to back young people, sometimes, not to talk too strongly and to be more diplomatic. They passionately talk about their problems that they are facing. And sometimes they even point out fingers with names and that make the situation more sensitive. But it tells that people are now willing to speak up and they are changing their attitude towards corruption.

Question: What tools are you using to fight against corruption?

Preap Kol: Currently we are focusing on three components. First one is research, to study; we do to diagnose the problems. So whatever we say about corruption in Cambodia it is coming from the scientific study, like we diagnose the problem with scientific tools, we say something with evidence with reference and that makes our finding very strong and that provokes discussion among stakeholders. And we do advocacy to address some of the problems that we find out.

Second is we do coalition building that brings together various actors and stakeholders, including government, civil society, private sector, media, young people and the general citizens. So we have been able to mobilize lot of coalition and individual to join. And the third is to engage youths and citizens actively.

These tools have given a holistic view of what the situation is. At the same times gives us a holistic approach to tackle corruption at the national level from the top down. Trying to push reform, trying to get policy dialogue into discussion, at the same time from the grass root level from the bottom up, we are engaging young people and citizen actively to take part in our process.

Question: People talked about best practices in the fight against corruption, what are the lessons that you learnt today?

Preap Kol: One of the things that I find interesting is how we manage to sustain and manage engagement with the people especially the volunteers that give some kinds of ideas from different chapters. We are engaging a lot with the youths now the question is what about the senior citizens. Why not we include them also. This is something that tricked me to think about in Cambodia. We haven’t been to engage senior citizens.

Another dimension is no impunity which is a broader picture of the things that TI is trying to advocate for and trying to start in different countries.

I was excited about the prospect of the Asia-Pacific youth community, which we plan to connect youth activists from different countries into the international and regional level. So they have another place and platform to interact and work together. This is something that is inspiring to me and there is a lot of prospect for moving it forward successfully. And Cambodia is ready to be part of this initiative. Preap Kol is the Executive Director of Transparency International Cambodia.

FIGHTING AGAINST CORRUPTION IN A COUNTRY LIKE CAMBODIA IS DIFFICULT

@rukshanasn

Billions of corrupt money is exported from most corrupt

countries to least corrupt countries annually.

#TIAPConnect

@T_Coombes

Did you know the region with worst #corruption is

#SouthAsia? Find out why Wednesday

http://www.transparency.org/news/pressrelease/behind_so

uth_asias_rampant_corruption#tiapconnect

HOW DOES ICT HELP US FIGHT CORRUPTION?

Taiwan – uses social media to launch and publicize integrity camps. The chapter uses Facebook to promote individual corruption fighter Mama Huang, a human rights fighter and whistle blower. She was nominated by the chapter for a TI Integrity Award and they use social media to promote this.

TI Malaysia - With probono support from an advertising company, the chapter put together a viral video campaign, “Do as kids do” showing that corruption is learned and not inherent. It was just launched a few days ago, but is one of the first steps in the chapter building up its public following. The chapter has shared it on FB, Twitter and it has also run on television.

TI Korea - Smile, an app developed by TI Korea following the hackathon and as part of the Youth Integrity Programme, includes comics, integrity videos, study materials, short novels and other interesting information young people can connect with to learn about corruption.

Question: Could you tell us about the tools that you are using to fight against corruption in Nepal?

Ashish Thapa: Over the years we have tried many tools, right now we are focusing on coalition building, advocacy, research, and networking.

Question: What are the challenges to fight corruption in Nepal? Any particular challenges different from other South Asian country?

Ashish Thapa: I think the problem is context driven. I cannot say problems are the same in the entire region. In Nepal, lack of focus on anti-corruption agenda especially by people who should be delivering their promises, that is the political class, itself has been a challenge.

Question: What are the best lessons from today's sessions?

Ashish Thapa: Few main lessons that I could pick up from the day today are using ICT as one of the effective tools to run a campaign against corruption. Second is advocacy, activism and volunteerism combined with a very professional approach is needed to bring more credibility and impact in the kind of work we do. Ashish Thapa is the Executive Director of TI Nepal.