The Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) chairman Iqbal Mahmood said on Sunday corruption happens in the country but we cannot stop it. If we cannot prevent it we are part of it.
He made these remarks while briefing journalists on 'Bangladesh's position on TI corruption index and Transparency International Bangladesh's (TIB's) observation' held at the ACC headquarters in the city's Segunbagicha.
There is no scope for complacency though Bangladesh has moved up two points in the world corruption perceptions index, he said.
"It wasn't an easy task to improve two notches in the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) prepared by Transparency International (TI), but concurrently, there is no scope for complacency," he said.
Corruption Perception Index-2017 was published by TI on February 22 where Bangladesh secured 143rd position out of a total 180 countries.
The list was prepared from least to most corrupt countries. Bangladesh was placed 145th on the 2016 index out of 176 countries; from that point of view, the country moved up by two points.
According to the CPI report-2017, Bangladesh scored 28 on the scale of 100 among all the countries, an increase by two points compared to 26 scored in CPI 2016.
From most to least corrupt countries, Bangladesh ranked as 17th most corrupt country in the world having a minimal improvement from the last year's position of 15th most corrupt country.
Though the country has made improvement last year, TIB marked the progress as a slower one.
Supporting the global graft watchdog's observation, the ACC chairman said, "May be it is possible for us to improve further; it can be achieved with combined efforts from all but it's quite hard to gain."
Mr Mahmood said there are so many graft incidents in the country, still the country is moving forward; but the advancement should be made more vigorous.
Mentioning that some countries saw improvement of only one point on the recently published CPI, he said only 10-12 countries have improved by two points as it is not so easy to raise the score by two points.
Responding to a question about the country's sluggish progress, he said, "We all are responsible for it. If you can't prevent corruption, you are a part of that. Grafts have been taking place but we couldn't prevent it, which indicates we all are responsible."
Expressing his observation about TIB's recommendation of setting more examples of punishing large-scale corrupts to improve Bangladesh's score in CPI, the ACC boss said, "Corrupts are always corrupts, we shouldn't distinguish them by big or small. Actions should be taken against all types of corrupts, and incidents of graft will not be reduced if it's discriminated by big and small."
However, he noted it is true that the commission couldn't set examples as per expectation, but it should also be understood that the task isn't easy.
Talking about money laundering from the country, the national anti-graft body chairman said it is not Bangladesh's problem alone, it is a global phenomenon.
Besides, he said there are limitations of ACC to take direct actions against money laundering under the existing laws.
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