New head of the Agency for State Financial Control and Combating Corruption under the President of Tajikistan has been appointed.
By president’s decree Sulaimon Sultonzoda, who had previously served as head of the personnel department at the Prosecutor-General’s Office, was appointed to head the anticorruption agency.
Tohir Nourzoda was appointed deputy director of the anticorruption agency.
Recall, the eldest son of Tajikistan’s president, Rustam Emomali, who had previously served as head of the anticorruption agency, was appointed as mayor of the country’s capital, Dushanbe, on January 12.
The anticorruption agency was created by president’s decree of January 10, 2007. It performs functions previously carried out by the State Financial Control Committee, Main Tax Police Directorate, Directorate for Combating Corruption and other agencies.
The agency is placed under president’s direct supervision, and it has staff of 450.
Tajikistan ranked joint 136th out 165 countries in Transparency International’s latest Corruption Perceptions Index — the same as Nigeria and 17 position below Russia.
Tajikistan signed up to the United Nations Convention against Corruption in 2006 and an anticorruption strategy for 2013-2020 was adopted in 2012.
Meanwhile, a new report by Transparency International, The Global Corruption Barometer 2016, says that nearly a third of public service users in the CIS nations reportedly paid a bribe (30 per cent) in the past year and bribery is highest in Tajikistan where this rises to 50 per cent of service users.
