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Malaysia’s new anti-corruption drive takes comic turn in battle for young minds
Anti-corruption chief Azam Baki turns to comics, films and live-streams to stop Malaysia from becoming a ‘corrupt-minded society’
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Malaysian children as young as four will be given comics on the evils of corruption, as the country’s anti-corruption commission turns to live-streamed court cases, films of scandals and other media outreach to expunge a scourge that is rooted deep in the nation’s society and politics.
Corruption dogs the reputation of the Southeast Asian nation, which has seen a succession of former prime ministers implicated in the theft of public funds running into billions of dollars. Perhaps the most notorious of those is Najib Razak, who remains in jail on convictions linked to the plunder of state coffers through the 1MDB fund.
The solution lies in turning the culture of corruption around among the country’s youth, according to Azam Baki, chief commissioner of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC).
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“This is so that they see corruption as something not good,” he said on Thursday. “It will be presented in a simple way, be it as a comic or digital format.”
He said he had held discussions with two local universities to develop a syllabus targeted at preschoolers about the perils of corruption.
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