International Anti-Corruption Day: Abolition of the article 119 encourages corruption in Algeria, lawyers say

Algiers (December 9)-Results of the anti-corruption law in Algeria, since its application in 2006, were positive and played a big role in exposing a number of officials, and detecting many economic scandals, which hit the largest companies such as Khalifa, Sonatrach, the highway project and the case of Achour Abderrahman as well, a human right activist and lawyer Mostapha Bouchachi, told Echorouk on the International Anti-Corruption Day.

The spokesman added that “an official who skims 10.000 AD resembles the one who embezzled a whole nation”.

Professor Khaled Berghel said that Bouchawchi’s opinion is right, asserting that the anti-corruption law encourages the emergence of this phenomenon more than fighting it; “We did not hear, since a decade, about cases of public money theft. Corruption was rare, but after 2006, stealing billions has become normal in Algeria. Every day we hear in the media that thousands of billions have been stolen in the state’s public and economic companies. If amounts of commissions and shares charges by officials in economic companies in the area of public transactions were collected, Algeria would complete major projects in the benefit of citizens”.

In the same context, professor Berghel noted that his inadvertent contact with files of corruption before justice show that the phenomenon is devastating the Algerian society, and such dangerous practices by high officials, which resulted in the abolition of article 119 of the Penal Code that applied the maximum of penalty against embezzlers through application of death penalty, then life prison then 20 years prison.

“After the amendment of the law on deterrent sections, the embezzlement of billions has become a regular phenomenon in Algeria”, he added.