PUTRAJAYA must be more deliberate in addressing issues of corruption and abuse of power with the younger generation to ensure they uphold integrity while in office, said newly-appointed Transparency International Malaysia (TI-M) president Muhammad Mohan.

He added an immediate action will be to conduct an integrity survey to gauge the state of ethics in today’s youth, adding that the last one conducted by the government was almost 15 years ago by Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM).

The online survey had asked graduates if they would receive bribes if they were in a position of power.

“Some 30% said yes. That 30% today is somewhere in our system,” Muhammad told The Malaysian Insight in a recent interview.

“We need to do another survey to find out where we are now.”

According to a study conducted by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission in 2016, about 16% of students in higher institutions of learning said they were willing to accept bribes if they had the opportunity and power to do so.

The study also found 18.2% of the students were prepared to give bribes to avoid action, an increase of 0.8% from 17.4% in 2015.

Muhammad said youth should speak up against corruption, and publicly speak out against it.

“We want them to speak up and expose corruption. They should speak in forums. One of the problems we see in Malaysian youth is that the ability to speak publicly is lacking.”

He said TI-M wants to engage with the Youth and Sports Ministry to organise debates on integrity and create activities for youth.

The ministry should be more focused on organising awareness events with enforcement agencies or civil society groups.

“All of this is about awareness, which is lacking. Ethics and fighting corruption are dry subjects. But if you know how to make it interesting for the youth, they will buy it.

“You can help transform at least one generation. These things will take time. But somebody has to start it.

“They (youth) are key to fighting corruption. They are the people we are looking to in the next few years.” – April 13, 2019