The ACC recently held a youth sensitisation on social auditing programme

Corruption: To build a community of awakened youth with high integrity, moral values and a sense of intolerance towards corruption, a youth sensitisation on social auditing programme was held at the Centenary Youth Village in Thimphu on March 7.

The Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) chairperson, Dasho Neten Zangmo, engaged in a dialogue with 35 youth that comprised Royal Institute of Management (RIM) trainees, students, youth volunteer, community based scouting members and officials from the ACC and Department of Youth and Sports.

According to the Transparency International’s Youth Integrity Survey 2011 and 2012, and Integrity and Value Educations in Schools 2012, it was found that youth are vulnerable to taking wrong paths to get what they desired. ACC officials said they needed to reach to the young, so that they are able to identify corrupt practices as a dangerous behaviour and stop getting involved in such acts.

An official from the Department of Youth and Sports said the programme aimed to utilise young people to educate their friends and families, apart from making themselves aware.

Dasho Neten Zangmo cited an example of Druk School in Thimphu, where students managed the check post to see if students were being dropped/picked up in pool/government vehicles.  The students at the gate, she said, gave a notice, asking the parent not to drop their child in a pool vehicle, if they see parents using such vehicles.

As a result, children are embarrassed, and they refuse to get dropped to their school in government vehicles.

In another example, she said, a father had given his car on hire to a private organisation, and had wanted to drop his daughter in his office car.  But, she said, the daughter refused to go to school, and the father had to hire a taxi to get his daughter dropped to school.

The chairperson said that youth as an individual and a community can make a difference in decreasing incidences of corruption. “Now, it’s not always the parents teaching right values to their kids; the kids teach their parents,” the chairperson said.

Sonam Tashi, a trainee with RIM, said attending such programme helped him take home the message, not to be corrupt in life.

Among the 10 youth centres in the country, eight are spread across other dzongkhags.  With support from UNICEF, the programme was organised by the department of youth and sports and the ACC.

By Dechen Tshomo

 

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