1.99% citizens paid bribes even to ACC officials, BBS survey finds

Even officials of the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) were reportedly bribed to provide services, with 1.99% of citizens admitting to paying a bribe for public services in the past year, according to a recent BBS survey.

According to the Citizen Perception Survey (CPS) conducted by the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS), people had to pay bribes to public officials in a total of 21 types of government offices.

The survey, published today (19 June), showed that more than 31% of citizens who accessed public services in the past year reported experiencing bribery or corruption, the rate significantly higher among men (38.62%) than women (22.71%).

Among public service institutions, people in the past year faced the highest level of bribery and corruption at the Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA), where 63.29% of service seekers said they had to bribe an official to receive a service.

This was followed by law enforcement agencies (61.94%), passport offices (57.45%), land registry offices (54.92%), judges or magistrates, prosecutors, and others (53.77%), and land record/acquisition/settlement office (51.40%).