Documents and regulations governing anti-corruption activities of the university
Regulatory legal and other acts in the field of anti-corruption:
How to minimize corruption?
Erkin DUISENOV,
Advisor to the Chancellor of the
Eurasian Law Academy named after D. A. Kunayev,
Doctor of Jurisprudence Sciences, Professor
The Address of the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev to the people "Kazakhstan in the new reality: time of action" emphasized: "The fight against corruption is becoming more systematic. More attention has been paid to the causes of corruption, and preventive work is being carried out".
The problem of combating corruption at the present stage in Kazakhstan is in the center of attention of civil society because the attitude of the people and their trust to it depends on how effectively the authorities will fight this social evil. This problem is periodically covered and raised in the media, in scientific research, at various events: conferences, round tables, etc.
Currently, there are different positions and approaches, both official and non-official, to solve the problem of combating corruption in the country. In this article, as a scholar-statesman, I will try to present my own, possibly different from the official one, vision of the solution to this problem from my civil position.
Without dwelling in detail on the historical origins of corruption, I would like to note that it did not appear in Kazakhstan suddenly and out of nowhere. It should be noted that the administrative-command system of state administration in the USSR with its party nomenclature was sick with corruption. But corruption in the Soviet Union has never been on such a scale as it is in the CIS today.
With its collapse, many party, Soviet and economic leaders, infected with corruption, smoothly moved to the chairs of heads of state authorities and organizations of already sovereign states formed in the post-Soviet space, including Kazakhstan. The beginning of democratization processes, the formation of new market economic relations, legislative consolidation of private property, de-ideologization of society, organizational instability of state structures, as well as the lack of effective legislation at that time, which ensured and regulated the above-mentioned transformations, became a fertile ground for the sprouting of widespread corruption.
The granting of functions and powers to state structures in the early 90s to license entrepreneurship, bank lending, privatization, unlimited control over the business sphere created a trough for bribery and other corrupt practices by state officials and, consequently, conditions for their exorbitant illegal enrichment. Embezzlement and squandering of state and people's property took on alarming proportions at that time. And it was then, as I believe, that a part of the state apparatus merged with organized crime, as huge stolen funds needed protection and "laundering". And it was during this period that corruption in Kazakhstan was formed as a systemic entity.
Circular bail, exorbitant greed, unscrupulousness, double morality, and a complete lack of responsibility for the fate of their people and their homeland are the main characteristic features of the subjects of systemic corruption. No country in the world has managed to avoid such an extremely negative social phenomenon as corruption, nor to completely eradicate it. Corruption scandals are often covered in the media even in such developed countries as the United States, Japan, and the European Union countries.
At the same time, it should be borne in mind that the fight against corruption, even formally at the level of legislation, is carried out in all countries of the world. But its results, as the world, including our Kazakhstani experience, show, are different. The effectiveness of the fight against corruption should be determined, first and foremost, by the increase in the welfare of citizens, their social security, and the economic growth of the state.
Returning once again to the reasons for such a rapid development of corruption in our country, I would like to note the most significant of them, which also take place in the modern Kazakhstani reality.
Firstly, with the collapse of the USSR and the formation of the sovereign state of Kazakhstan, we completely abandoned the communist ideology, by the way, the ideology of highly humane and highly moral, without offering instead a new ideology - an ideology preaching highly human, common human, common social and moral values. And the state must have an ideology, otherwise it has no prospects for civilized development. This caused considerable damage to the public consciousness, in which a vacuum was formed. This vacuum immediately began to be filled by ideas alien to the people of quick, including illegal enrichment, the cult of money, and so on. As a result, bribery became the norm of behavior of most officials of the pseudo-market formation.
Secondly, the political elite underestimated the scope and scale of corruption, which already in the first years of independence permeated all state bodies from bottom to top.
Third, the absence of strategic program documents to combat corruption at that time made corruption processes unmanageable by the state. In short, the state failed to identify the most priority areas of the fight against corruption, for example, in the banking sector, law enforcement and the judiciary. As a rule, anti-corruption campaigns in that period were haphazard, sporadic, and ended with the capture of the "main corruptors" in the country - doctors and teachers.
Fourth, imperfect and often contradictory legislation (or lack thereof), especially public service and anti-corruption legislation, has also contributed to the rapid growth of corruption in the country.
Fifth, the extremely low salaries of civil servants to ensure a more or less decent way of life was and still is an "incentive" for officials to take bribes.
Sixth, the low level of legal consciousness and legal knowledge among the population, including officials, has also become a favorable environment for corruption to flourish.
Seventh, as a rule, the fight was conducted against the consequences of already committed corruption offenses, rather than against the causes and conditions that contributed to their commitment.
These are the main reasons for such a rapid growth and flourishing of corruption in our country. These reasons have not been eliminated in many respects even in the modern reality of Kazakhstan.
At the present stage, however, a number of positive trends in the fight against corruption in the country can be noted.
Over the past ten years, the country's leadership, realizing the scale of corruption and the irreversible consequences that this social evil has inflicted and can continue to inflict on the state if its level, which has exceeded the critical mark, is not reduced, has taken a number of political, organizational, legal and economic measures aimed at reducing it.
Thus, in the Strategy "Kazakhstan-2050" on December 14, 2012, the First President of the Republic of Kazakhstan Nursultan Abishevich Nazarbayev notes: "The state and society must stand united against corruption. Corruption is not just an offense. It undermines faith in the effectiveness of the state and is a direct threat to national security. We must sharply strengthen the fight against corruption, including by improving anti-corruption legislation, in order to achieve our ultimate goal of eradicating corruption as a phenomenon".
In subsequent program political and legal documents, such as "Plan of the Nation - 100 Concrete Steps", messages to the people of Kazakhstan Yelbasy Nursultan Nazarbayev and President of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev also note the need to wage a relentless fight against corruption.
Having determined and accepted the facts that corruption is a threat to national security, undermines the foundations of our sovereign statehood, causes significant damage to the economic development of the country and, as a consequence, adversely affects the social protection of citizens, reduces the welfare of ordinary people, and hinders the implementation of social and economic reforms, the state has given the fight against corruption a more or less systemic character.
Having proclaimed in his election platform the continuity of the course of the First President of Kazakhstan N. A. Nazarbayev, the current Head of the State, Kassym-Jomart Kemelevich Tokayev, both in his election platform and in his Address to the people of Kazakhstan on September 2, 2019, promises to carry on the fight against corruption until its complete eradication and notes the relevance of the further fight against it. And this is very important for the simple reason that the main condition for effective and efficient fight against corruption is the political will of the President of the country. If there is a real political will, it is possible to significantly reduce the level of corruption in the country, and in a relatively short period of time.
If the political will is only formal, then no laws and organizational measures will help to reduce the level of corruption. Precisely to reduce it to a level that is safe for the state and society, as it has already been noted that no country has been able to eradicate it completely.
The above-mentioned positions of the First President of Kazakhstan N.A. Nazarbayev and the current President of the country K.-J. Tokayev give reason to believe that the country's leadership has the political will to fight corruption ruthlessly. The political will of the Head of State must be impartial and uncompromising, as it implies a unified and objective approach to the methods, often very harsh, of combating this social evil. This means that the Head of State must finally and irrevocably decide to mercilessly destroy any manifestations of corruption in all, without exception, spheres of public life, regardless of faces, positions, ranks, and merits.
The psychological difficulty in the realization of political will by the Head of State is that it may be necessary to " jail" colleagues, comrades, friends and even relatives. And it is very difficult to do this with our mentality, but it is necessary.
The political will of our President K.-J. Tokayev is most clearly manifested in his instructions and tasks, outlined in his Address to the people of Kazakhstan on September 1 this year, in terms of relentless fight against corruption and uncompromising in this fight.
The realization of the political will of the Head of State needs to determine the priorities on which the positive outcome of the fight against corruption depends. The main and most important priority in this direction must be legislation, which is the main instrument not only in the fight against corruption, but also one of the main regulators of social relations.
In my opinion, it is necessary to start by analyzing the current legislation on combating corruption, including constitutional legislation. Timely President K.-J. Tokayev in his Address to the People of Kazakhstan notes: "Now it is necessary to conduct an anti-corruption analysis of normative acts and work processes in state bodies and quasi-sector to identify corruptionogenic factors".
At the beginning of the article, it is not by chance that I made an excursion into the history of the emergence and spread of corruption in the country as a large-scale social evil, because it was in the first years of sovereignty that corrupt officials and dirty businessmen made huge fortunes, which, for the most part, were transferred abroad. These are grave and especially grave economic and official crimes committed since the day Kazakhstan gained sovereignty. The question is as follows: can the people get back the funds stolen, illegally obtained in the form of bribes, amounting to billions of US dollars, and bring to justice the perpetrators of these crimes? From the position of the formal-legal approach it is practically impossible to do this, since the law does not have retroactive force, i.e. it cannot act to worsen the situation of persons who committed crimes before the adoption of the law, and the humanization of criminal legislation carried out in recent years makes it unlikely at all.
In addition, there is a statute of limitations after which a person cannot be held legally liable. However, we must not forget that, according to article 3, paragraph 1, of the Constitution, the only source of power is the people, and paragraph 2 of the same article provides that the people exercise power directly through a national referendum. With regard to the Constitution, it should be noted that the Basic Law does not have a specific author; it is the people who adopt the Constitution by free expression of their will in a national referendum. In this aspect it is appropriate to note the position of the President of the RoK K.-J. Tokayev, according to which the most important issues of public and state life should be decided by referendum. For our citizens and society as a whole there is perhaps no more important issue today than the fight against corruption. Therefore, the introduction of the following proposed amendments and additions to the Constitution by nationwide expression of the will in a national referendum can create a real legal basis for minimizing the level of corruption in the country.
For this purpose, the following provision should be included in the Constitution in a separate paragraph or article: "The statute of limitations shall not apply to persons who have committed grave and especially grave official and economic crimes since the day Kazakhstan gained sovereignty".
This provision will make it possible not only to prosecute bribe-taking officials and treasury thieves, corrupt bankers and other tycoons who made huge fortunes on money stolen from the people, but even those who have fled the country and are currently abroad, regardless of the time of the crime they committed. Moreover, it will allow at least partially returning the stolen money to the people, i.e., the funds that the country, especially its social sphere, needs so much today. It is clear that such a decision will cause strong opposition from treasury thieves of various stripes. It will require great efforts from the Head of State to realize his political will. However, ordinary citizens and progressive institutions of civil society will definitely support such a decision. This will create a basis for the realization of the principle of inevitability of punishment for a committed crime. By the way, this principle, as the basic principle of criminal prosecution, for reasons unknown to me and my numerous colleagues, has disappeared from our criminal legislation.
I would like to point out at once that there is another position, polar opposite to the above mentioned one. According to this position, the state, i.e. its Head K.-J. Tokayev should initiate and conduct capital amnesty. We must assume that this position should be considered no other than an attempt by individuals to legitimize the stolen goods, to evade responsibility and, perhaps even to return to the political elite of the country.
With regard to criminal legislation in the area of combating corruption and in the economic sphere, I would like to note once again the excessive, in my view, humanization that has been carried out in the country in recent years. Not being a specialist in the science of criminal law, nevertheless I would like to draw attention to the fact that in Chapter 15 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Kazakhstan "Corruption and other offenses against the interests of public service and public administration" the crime provided for by Article 364 "Illegal participation in entrepreneurial activity" is not even a serious crime, failing to mention that this unlawful act can be transferred to the category of particularly serious crimes, since it undermines the foundations of the civil service and allows public office to be used for personal enrichment. Chapter of the Criminal Code "Criminal Offenses in the Sphere of Economic Activity" contains 34 articles, of which the court will not be able to qualify any of these acts as a "particularly grave" crime. Such crimes as "Manufacturing, storage, transportation or sale of counterfeit money or securities" are not particularly grave crimes.
(Art. 231), "Economic Contraband" (Art. 234), "Driven to insolvency" (Art. 239) and some others.
In Soviet times, for example, more severe penalties, up to and including the death penalty, were applied for counterfeit money and smuggling. After all, these crimes undermine the economic foundations of our state, cause huge economic damage and the degree of their public danger, in my opinion, the legislator inordinately underestimates the degree of their public danger. It is clear that the state, legislators want to protect business, entrepreneurial activity in Kazakhstan, but it should be done and is already partially done by protecting entrepreneurs and business in general from unwarranted inspections, illegal interference of government agencies in this area of activity, but not by unreasonable, in my opinion, mitigation of liability for such offenses. That is why President K.-J. Tokayev in his Address dated September 1, 2020, notes: "I repeat: any illegal interference of state structures in entrepreneurial activity, obstruction of the work of businessmen must be perceived as the gravest crime against the state".
Today, the political elite, society and every single citizen of the country must realize that any corruption and economic crimes do not just cause economic damage to the budget of the state, they strike a blow to the social sphere: they take away a piece of bread from orphans, medicines from the sick, allowances and pensions from the disabled and the elderly. Teachers, doctors, and other public sector workers receive meager salaries, unable to provide them with a more decent standard of living. Today, every tenge stolen or withheld from the state is money stolen from the people. The state cannot raise the salaries of civil servants, and low salaries encourage them to commit corruption offenses.
Now about the moral damage caused by corruption to society and the state. There are reasons to believe that the political elite, legislators, and society as a whole still underestimate the degree of public danger of corruption offenses. After all, corruption, first of all, harms the spirituality, morality and ethics of our people, decomposing society from within and deforming people's consciousness, including legal consciousness.
Society today must realize that in the conditions of economic crisis, a thief in the minister's chair is much more dangerous for the state than a thief in the law! Corruption in the sphere of state power, especially in law enforcement and judicial bodies, reduces people's faith in justice, right and the law, undermines confidence in the authorities as a whole and creates social tension in society.
In this aspect, the proposals of the Anti-Corruption Agency to amend the country's criminal legislation to strengthen the liability of law enforcement officers, special agencies and judges should be recognized as well-founded and timely. The legislator, I believe, should support the proposals of this agency, and include such a qualifying feature as "official with special status" in the content of corruption offenses. These are persons who are charged with the duty to fight corruption, render fair verdicts and judgments, protect the rights and freedoms of citizens, and safeguard the interests of the state. Therefore, they should be punished more severely and mercilessly for committing corruption offenses. There are reasons to believe that all, without exception, corruption offenses, the subjects of which are the above-mentioned persons, regardless of the economic damage caused by them, in the conditions of modern Kazakhstan reality should be qualified as "especially grave", i.e. for which criminal liability from 12 years of imprisonment and above is provided for.
The above also fully corresponds to the instruction of the Head of State, outlined in the Address to the people of Kazakhstan on September 1 this year as follows: "It is necessary to make changes to the Criminal Code in terms of toughening the punishment for corruption of law enforcement officers, judges, bribe-givers and intermediaries in bribery". It should be noted that intermediary in bribery (Article 368 of the Criminal Code of the RoK) is not a particularly serious crime under the current criminal law.
Awareness in society of the fact that the country today is sick and sick not just with a "virus" but, speaking the language of medicine, with a malignant tumor, the name of which is corruption, and the realization that this tumor is growing, progressing and its metastases are penetrating deeper and deeper, should lead any sane person to the need for a surgical operation. Otherwise, the country, as an organism, may perish, i.e. lose statehood, sovereignty, turning into a colony of another, economically more powerful state. Painful operation on merciless destruction of corruption, which, in my opinion, today represents even a greater threat than the threat of international terrorism, can significantly improve the country, create conditions for its further positive development with subsequent entry, according to the Strategy "Kazakhstan-2050", into the 30 most developed countries.
Today, modern corrupt officials commit not only criminal but also anti-people acts. Their actions actually sabotage the implementation of state programs and instructions of the Head of State K.-J. Tokayev. Therefore, any corrupt person is not only a criminal, but also an enemy of the people of Kazakhstan. And it is from this position that one should proceed when assessing cases of corrupt practices in the work of state authorities and officials who determine anti-corruption policy, law enforcement and other state authorities fighting corruption, and judges passing sentences for corruption offenses.
At present, President K.-J. Tokayev is offered to become "Kazakhstan's Stalin". It seems that we should not follow this path, although certain methods, such as declaring corrupt officials "enemies of the people of Kazakhstan" and toughening punishment, should be used. There are examples of countries that have managed to minimize the level of corruption due, first of all, to the political will of the Head of State. For example, the same Singapore, where the legendary Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, speaking of principles, noted: "It is not difficult to get to work by declaring high moral standards, firm conviction and a strong desire to fight corruption. It is difficult to live by these principles. And it is possible only when a country has leaders who are strong and judicious enough to punish all violators without exception. We must assume that we have such leaders in our country.
The political will of our President is already manifested in the prohibition of parole for persons convicted of corruption offenses, i.e. the previously mentioned principle of inevitability of punishment should remain unchanged. Simply put, this principle means that a thief must sit in jail! Ordinary people perceive such a decision with hope and enthusiasm.
It should be noted that this prohibition was formulated by the Head of State in his Address to the people of Kazakhstan on September 1 of year as follows: "In respect of persons who have committed corruption offenses, parole will not be applied".
Further realization of the political will of the Head of State, as noted above, should move to the legal plane, at the level, as I believe, of legislation, including at the level of the Basic Law of the country.
Not limiting myself to the above-mentioned proposal to eliminate in the Constitution the statute of limitations for persons who have committed grave and especially grave corruption and economic crimes since the day Kazakhstan gained sovereignty, I believe it is possible at this stage, given the threat posed by corruption to our national security, to go down the path of tougher punishment for corrupt officials, up to the ultimate penalty of the death penalty. As a matter of fact, in neighboring China, it is precisely this punishment applied to major bribe-taking officials that contributes to that country's strong social and economic development. For this purpose, it is necessary to revise the content of paragraph 2 of Article 15 of the Constitution, stating it in the following wording: "The death penalty shall be established by law as an exceptional measure of punishment for terrorist crimes involving loss of life, as well as for particularly grave corruption, economic crimes and crimes committed in wartime, with the right of the sentenced person to apply for mercy". Alternatively, this paragraph of Article 15 of the Constitution could be worded as follows: "The death penalty shall be established by law as an exceptional measure of punishment for particularly grave crimes, with the right of the sentenced person to apply for mercy". This option would allow the legislator to define other particularly grave crimes for which the death penalty may be applied.
For example, today society is intensively raising the issue of the need to introduce the death penalty for particularly serious crimes committed against children and minors. This does not mean that the death penalty, as an exceptional measure of punishment, will be carried out, since a moratorium on it, as well as on pardons, is the exclusive prerogative of the President of Kazakhstan. It should be assumed that the introduction (even temporarily) of the death penalty will become a serious deterrent to the growth of corruption in the country. I would also like to note that this and a number of other proposals to improve and modernize legislation, including constitutional legislation, were sent by me to Akorda for consideration. I hope that they will be used in legislation for the benefit of the people of Kazakhstan.
In addition, in my opinion, it is necessary to revise the Code of the Republic of Kazakhstan on Administrative Offenses in terms of transferring all elements of articles of Chapter 34 "Corrupt Administrative Offenses" to the category of criminal offenses. Given the ever-increasing degree of public danger, economic damage and moral harm inflicted on society and the state by corruption offenses, it is impossible to consider the latter as administrative offenses. This is tantamount to how one cannot be "a little corrupt" or "a little thief".
The strengthening of responsibility for corruption in the Constitution could be enshrined in Article 34(1) of the Basic Law, adding the words "to counteract corruption" and read as follows: "Everyone is obliged to observe the Constitution and legislation of the Republic of Kazakhstan, to respect the rights, freedoms, honor and dignity of other persons, to counteract corruption". Of course, it is clear that compliance with the legislation itself means not committing, including corruption offenses. However, imposing an obligation on everyone to counteract corruption would create a basis for current legislation to increase liability for failure to fulfill the constitutional obligation to counteract corruption. Here we are talking more about the obligation of everyone not to remain aloof from the facts of a committed or impending corruption offense, but to bring this information to the attention of anti-corruption authorities in a timely manner. In this case, we are not talking about "squealing", but about the normal instinct of self-preservation of our statehood. This is the most effective way to form anti-corruption legal consciousness.
In this aspect, the task outlined in the President's Address to the People of Kazakhstan of September 1 this year "to form at the legislative level a system of protection of persons who have reported facts of corruption" is quite timely and justified.
At the same time, it should be borne in mind that in addition to toughening the main punishment for corruption offenses, the state should use all other methods and ways of combating corruption, which will give this fight a more systemic character. First of all, we are talking about the need for a wider use of the existing potential, including constitutional legislation, as additional punishments to be applied along with the main ones to persons who have committed grave and especially grave corruption offenses.
Thus, our Constitution contains a provision in paragraph 2 of Article 10, according to which "deprivation of citizenship is allowed only by court decision for committing terrorist crimes, as well as for causing other grave harm to the vital interests of the Republic of Kazakhstan". Especially grave corruption offenses at this stage may well be considered as having caused grave harm to the vital interests of the Republic.
At one of the scientific events, when I voiced this proposal, one of my colleagues noted that then we would have to deprive half of the population of Kazakhstan of citizenship. But in this aspect, we are talking only about persons who have committed especially grave corruption offenses, i.e. those for which the sanction of the criminal law provides for imprisonment for a term of 12 years or more. From the point of view of morality and morals, I think that a person who steals a lot from his people and the state has no right to be a citizen. The state and society will not lose much by depriving a corrupt enemy of his people of the right to be a citizen of the country. In the UK, for example, citizenship is seen as a privilege rather than a right. It is time for our state to adopt this approach as well. Here we are not talking about deprivation of citizenship with subsequent expulsion from Kazakhstan, but about defeat, first of all, in political rights: to be elected and to be elected to the bodies of state power, prohibition to enter the civil service, etc.
Therefore, the legislator, as I believe, should revise, and provide for certain articles of corruption and economic crimes in the Criminal Code with possible application to their perpetrators, along with confiscation of property deprivation of citizenship as additional punishment. This will be another real legal barrier deterring corruption in the country and self-purification of society and the state. The need to ban corrupt officials from holding public office for life was made very clear by our President in his address to the people of Kazakhstan on September 1, where he noted: "It is necessary to adhere strictly to the rule prohibiting persons found guilty of corruption from working in the civil service or quasi-public sector for life term".
It is not by chance that the healthy forces of the country constantly emphasize the need for a preventive fight against corruption. And this is very important, because such a fight involves identifying the causes and conditions accompanying the commission of corruption offenses. In this direction, it is necessary to rethink the existing laws on civil service and anti-corruption efforts. The effectiveness of any law is determined by concrete results, and since the level of corruption in the country still leaves much to be desired, this is an indicator of the effectiveness of our laws. However, to be fair, it should be noted that according to the global anti-corruption movement Transparency International for 2019, Kazakhstan scored 34 points and took 113th position out of 180 states, along with the Philippines, Zambia, Nepal, El Salvador, Swaziland. This is already a progressive indicator compared to 2018.
Nevertheless, referring to the laws on civil service and anti-corruption adopted in 2015 to implement the Strategy "Kazakhstan-2050" and the Plan of the Nation "100 Concrete Steps", it should be noted that the law on civil service, for example, is more voluminous in content compared to the previous law (69 articles against 29 in the old one). This law was presented by the developers as one of the best in the post-Soviet space. It must be assumed that a lot of budgetary funds were spent on its development. However, over five years it has been amended 18 times: changes and additions have been made to dozens of articles, which should not be characteristic of a quality law. And this fact itself is an indicator of instability and short-term nature of the norms contained in it.
Indeed, the level of corruption in the country is directly related to the quality and high efficiency of anti-corruption and public service legislation. It can be argued that the legal barriers established by this legislation and aimed at deterring corruption offenses are either imperfect or not working. Today, for example, in order to combat corruption, the legislator may easily expand the list of relatives of certain categories of state officials whose incomes are subject to mandatory declaration and verification, including not only close relatives, but all other relatives as well.
It is necessary to establish in imperative norms the prohibition of certain political civil officials to send their children to be educated abroad, since this issue is also a matter of our national security. Here I would like to note at once that I have repeatedly proposed in my scientific publications and in the media to reduce substantially the Register of Public Positions of Political Civil Servants. Well, the activities of deputy heads of state authorities and others cannot be of a politically determining nature, as it is formulated in the legislation. It is the prerogative of the first head of the public authority to determine the policy of the public authority, as well as to be personally responsible for its activities. It would seem to be an axiom. By the way, this is what the Head of State spoke about in his Address to the people.
Now on confiscation of property from those found guilty of corruption. It is no secret that the stolen money is put on relatives and, as a rule, is taken abroad to the so-called offshore, where it is materialized in the form of elite property, businesses, and bank accounts.
Illegal enrichment of state officials often occurs by creating the most favorable conditions for business activities of their close and distant relatives. There is a lot for the legislator to think about, besides the fact that it is necessary to establish real legal barriers for all, without exception, relatives of major officials to acquire real estate abroad, as well as for them to open money accounts in foreign banks.
As for government officials themselves, the Head of State in the above-mentioned Address to the People of Kazakhstan notes the expediency of introducing new anti-corruption tools: "Starting from 2021, a new anti-corruption restriction should be introduced for civil servants, deputies, judges regarding holding accounts, keeping cash and valuables in foreign banks".
Returning to the problem of withdrawal of funds stolen from the people abroad, I would like to note that our Head of State can really establish a legal barrier to this. It is well known that President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev is a world-renowned diplomat, a man who held a very responsible position in the UN, and his authority in the international arena is unquestionable. The Head of State, using his authority and his contacts, through international negotiations is able to create a "least favorable" regime for the withdrawal of capital abroad, including the so-called offshore zones. It is necessary to make it economically unprofitable and dangerous to export capital abroad in terms of transparency of funds withdrawn abroad. Here it is also necessary to legislate at the interstate level to solve the issue of returning to Kazakhstan the property and money, the legality of the origin of which is not confirmed by documents, not to mention the funds stolen from the people. For example, the President of the Russian Federation V. Putin has already started to carry out such work.
A systemic approach in the fight against corruption implies the possibility of using all legal means and methods to eradicate this social evil that has overwhelmed our society. One of them can and should become administrative justice, as one of the tools to protect the rights of citizens and their associations from unreasonable actions of state bodies and officials.
Involvement of civil society, as the Head of State rightly pointed out, can be an effective way to fight corruption. Here it is appropriate to note such an important aspect as ideological work of the state and its bodies, civil society institutions (political parties and other public associations, religious organizations) to form anti-corruption legal consciousness in society, the perception of this social evil as an anti-people act. This could include religious sermons in mosques, churches, synagogues, etc. to explain the extent of the evils of corruption.
Another important means of combating corruption is economic incentives for civil servants with decent remuneration for their work. The meager salaries of our officials, as already noted, encourage them to commit corruption offenses. It is no coincidence that Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew wrote: "If we do not pay people who have the appropriate intelligence and moral character for the position of minister, how can we expect them to last long in a position where they earn only a fraction of what they could earn in the private sector? Ministers and officials who are underpaid have already ruined more than one Asian government".
It seems that the instruction of the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, voiced in the Address to the people of Kazakhstan on September 1 on the reduction of the state apparatus and quasi-state sector, will allow the funds freed up from the reduction of employees to be used to increase the salaries of officials and will serve as an additional support for the honest performance of their duties. In conclusion, I would like to note once again that the implementation of the political will of the Head of State, a systematic approach consisting in the use of legislative, ideological, organizational, economic and other measures, as well as the creation in society of intolerance to any manifestation of corruption as an anti-people hostile phenomenon will really make it possible to minimize its level in our country.