Busan Port Authority Appoints One Additional Legal Expert as Integrity Citizen Auditor to Strengthen External Oversight and Fairness

[Asia Economy Reporter Joo Sang-don] Busan Port Authority (BPA) has appointed an additional legal expert in the shipping and port sector as an Integrity Citizen Auditor.

On the 3rd, the authority announced that it will expand the operation of the Integrity Citizen Auditor system, a private-participation anti-corruption system that has been in operation since last year, to foster a sound and transparent organizational culture.

The authority has been operating the Integrity Citizen Auditor system since 2014, expanding from the Integrity Ombudsman system introduced in 2010 to create a healthy organizational culture and a transparent Busan Port.

Until now, the Integrity Citizen Auditors have been composed of four experts in accounting, operations, and construction. To strengthen external oversight and fairness in management, from August, one legal expert in the shipping and port sector has been added, expanding the team to five members.

The main activity scope of the Citizen Auditors has also been expanded and strengthened from the original monitoring and evaluation of project progress and proposals for anti-corruption and integrity policies to include ▲ corruption and safety inspections ▲ investigations into power abuse practices ▲ joint investigations of audit reports ▲ joint inspections of employee codes of conduct.

Earlier this year, the authority established the 'BPA Power Abuse Eradication Measures' and prepared detailed implementation plans to thoroughly eliminate factors causing power abuse in regulatory systems, operate a power abuse reporting support center, and strictly punish unfair practices or serious power abuse acts under a zero-tolerance principle. Additionally, when signing contracts for accounting, tax, and information security consulting recently, a 'Letter of Integrity' signed by the president was delivered to the respective companies, and such letters are now provided in all contracts with external clients.

Nam Ki-chan, president of BPA, said, "We will do our best to create a clean and transparent Busan Port by systematically diagnosing corruption-inducing factors through rigorous ethical management practices and the activities of the Integrity Citizen Auditors."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.