The anti-corruption commission in Mon State has said that it was only able to investigate nine out of more than 800 letters of complaint over the last two years—some one percent of reported incidents.

They looked into one case in 2018 and eight in 2019, and transferred 84 complaints to the Mon State government.

Myo Myint, a member of the state’s anti-corruption commission, told NMG that they received 485 complaint letters in 2018 and 398 this year. He added that both the government’s departments and people in the state need to participate in the anti-corruption movement as party of their national duty.

December 9 marked International Anti-Corruption Day.

Deputy speaker of the Mon State parliament Dr. Aung Naing Oo said that good governance was not possible alongside corruption.

“In my opinion, we want to focus on prevention. It’s better to prevent the case before it happens. It’s too late if we are going to take action after it has already happened,” he told NMG.

Nationally, the anti-corruption commission reportedly received 10,543 complaint letters from across Burma in 2018. The commission could charge 46 people in 31 cases.

Officials from the commission said the complaints this year totaled 9,359. The commission charged 74 people in 86 cases.