Speaking at the session of the General Council of Deloyaya Rossiya (DR), a public organisation representing medium-sized business, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin urged entrepreneurs to give up shady business practices. In return, the executives promised Putin to work on making their businesses transparent. Thus, they want to establish their own centre for countering corporate raiders and corruption and to set up a special website where anyone can submit a complaint “DalVzyatku.ru” (“I gave a bribe”).
“I’d like to remind you that improving the business climate is a two-way street,” Putin said. “Business people must abide by the laws, honour their commitments and give up shady business practices – and not because they are afraid of being caught but because it is dishonest to cheat customers, their own employees or dodge taxes.
This is not the first meeting between the business community and the government. In the past they complained about insurmountable administrative barriers and now they want to improve the business climate for the country as a whole. This is why they’ve decided to fight corporate raiders and corruption. At the meeting of the General Council yesterday, DR presented a project of its own anti-corruption and anti-raider centre and Putin fully supported this idea.
DR Chairman Boris Titov said that there are plenty of complaints about corruption but they must be thoroughly filtered. From 20% to 30% of all complaints are unsubstantiated. Filters should reduce their number and separate overt lies from cases when the law had been violated. This will be the centre’s main goal. If a complaint is justified, the centre will also suggest a solution to the problem and a plan of cooperation with government agencies.
“If there is a problem at an economic agency, this work will be carried out by economic agencies, if this is related to actions by law-enforcement bodies (the Prosecutor’s Office or the police), our centre will cooperate with them, too,” Titov explained.
This should be a private-public centre so that both government officials and business people could take part in its work. DR wants to open two websites, one of which will be run in cooperation with the Ministry of Regional Development and deal with complaints addressed to specific officials. If a problem is not resolved it will be possible to address such heavyweights as Prosecutor-General Yury Chaika, First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov and Head of the Presidential Anti-Corruption Council and Kremlin Chief of Staff Sergei Naryshkin.
“The other site, “DalVzyatku.ru”, is for collecting information about everything that happens in this sphere. Reports will be anonymous. This is not our invention: A similar site exists in India and is very helpful for the Indian government,” Titov added.
“The main thing is to make sure nobody finances this initiative. If there is no money, the sites will work well. If there is money, nothing will work,” DR representative Sergei Gabesto explained.
DR is planning to pay for the project with its own money. It is very proud that it has never used any public funds.
Anastasia Savinykh