Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Thursday swore in eight newly- appointed ministers, stressing that priority now is to combat corruption.
Later, the President chaired a meeting for the Cabinet with all members, talking about the priorities of work in the next stage, most importantly, combating corruption.
“We should look at corruption through a comprehensive vision, because it is not limited to using authority to achieve private interests, but, any defect in the state is a corruption, like wasting money, striking institutions and the retreat in the quality of services are faces of corruption that lead to the culture of chaos and frustration, so a lot of people consider corruption and terrorism as two faces for one coin,” Assad said.
The Syrian president considered that punishing the corrupt is necessary, but most importantly is deterrence and prevention, affirming that the prevention starts from structure, legislations and laws.
Meanwhile, Assad made clear that the biggest part of corruption comes from some gaps in the laws, indicating that the common denominator among the majority of laws is putting exceptional items in them, and that leads to corruption, affirming that all ministries must work immediately to abolish the exceptions in the laws.
“All Ministers should take immediate procedures that achieve tangible outcomes to be touched upon by the citizen,” President al-Assad said, adding that not only the corrupt must be punished, but we should strike the corrupt environment to decrease those corrupt officials in a way to have a simpler punishment process.
Source: Agencies
