Date of Submission to Coordination Unit:
A. GENERAL INFORMATION
1. Activity Name
Accountability Enhancement Project2. Requestor Information
Name: Dr. Mohammed Ahmed Ali Al-Hawri / Title: Deputy MinisterOrganization and Address: Ministry of Planning & International Cooperation (MoPIC), Sana’a, Republic of Yemen
Telephone: +967- 711 941 100; + 967-1-250-665 / Email:
3. Recipient Entity
Name: Mrs. Afrah Baduwailan / Title: ChairOrganization and Address: Supreme National Authority for Combating Corruption (SNACC), Sana’a, Republic of Yemen
Telephone: +967-1-291-421; +967-1-299-630; +967-1-299 832; +967-1-777-383-140 / Email:
4. ISA SC Representative
Name: Bernard Funck / Title: Sector Director, Poverty Reduction and Economic Management (MNSPR), Middle East & North Africa RegionOrganization and Address: The World Bank
MSN J5-503
1818 H Street NW, Washington DC 20433, USA
Telephone: + 202 473 0874 / Email:
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5. Type of Execution (check the applicable box)
Type / Endorsements / Justification√ / Country-Execution / Attach written endorsement from designated ISA
Joint Country/ISA-Execution / Attach written endorsement from designated ISA / (Provide justification for ISA-Execution)
ISA-Execution for Country / Attach written endorsement from designated ISA / (Provide justification for ISA-Execution)
ISA-Execution for Parliaments / Attach written endorsements from designated Ministry and ISA
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6. Geographic Focus
√ / Individual country (name of country): Republic of YemenRegional or multiple countries (list countries):
7. Amount Requested (USD)
Amount Requested for direct Project Activities:(of which Amount Requested for direct ISA-Executed Project Activities): / US$6.0 mil.
Amount Requested for ISA Indirect Costs:[1] / US$480,500.00
Total Amount Requested: / US$6, 480,500.00
8. Expected Project Start, Closing and Final Disbursement Dates
Start Date: / January 1, 2014 / Closing Date: / December 31, 2016 / End Disbursement Date: / April 30, 20179. Pillar(s) to which Activity Responds
Pillar / Primary(One only) / Secondary
(All that apply) / Pillar / Primary
(One only) / Secondary
(All that apply)
Investing in Sustainable Growth. This could include such topics as innovation and technology policy, enhancing the business environment (including for small and medium-sized enterprises as well as for local and foreign investment promotion), competition policy, private sector development strategies, access to finance, addressing urban congestion and energy intensity. / Enhancing Economic Governance. This could include areas such as transparency, anti-corruption and accountability policies, asset recovery, public financial management and oversight, public sector audit and evaluation, integrity, procurement reform, regulatory quality and administrative simplification, investor and consumer protection, access to economic data and information, management of environmental and social impacts, capacity building for local government and decentralization, support for the Open Government Partnership, creation of new and innovative government agencies related to new transitional reforms, reform of public service delivery in the social and infrastructure sectors, and sound banking systems. / √
Inclusive Development and Job Creation. This could include support of policies for integrating lagging regions, skills and labor market policies, increasing youth employability, enhancing female labor force participation, integrating people with disabilities, vocational training, pension reform, improving job conditions and regulations, financial inclusion, promoting equitable fiscal policies and social safety net reform. / Competitiveness and Integration. This could include such topics as logistics, behind-the-border regulatory convergence, trade strategy and negotiations, planning and facilitation of cross-border infrastructure, and promoting and facilitating infrastructure projects, particularly in the areas of urban infrastructure, transport, trade facilitation and private sector development.
B. STRATEGIC CONTEXT
10. Country and Sector Issues
After almost two years of crisis, in the wake of the Arab Spring movement, Yemen embarked on a political transition, with the formation of the Government of National Reconciliation and swearing in of a new President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi. The transition is expected to end after the legislative and presidential elections, to be held under the new constitution. During the transition period, the Government is hosting a National Dialogue and drafting a new constitution. This will be followed by the election of a new president and formation of a new parliament. The National Dialogue is providing a forum for negotiating a new governance framework, under which future economic and social policies would be created and implemented. The transition National Reconciliation Government is currently made up of a coalition of elements of the previous regime and members of the opposition. The Council of Ministers has a total of 34 members – with 17 from the former regime and 17 from a coalition of opposition parties under a Joint Meeting Parties (JMP). The National Dialogue process has offered an opportunity to bring together rival factions and enhance the state’s authority. The people of Yemen have high expectations of institutional change during this period.Poor governance, corruption, and limited access to services and economic opportunities were key triggers of the 2011 protests. The quality of governance and service delivery remains weak, aggravating the country’s development challenges. Most institutions are relatively weak, as reflected by the country’s low overall score of 3.0 out of 6.0 on the Country Policy and Institutional Assessment (CPIA). The civil service remains inappropriately staffed and adequate management and incentive systems are lacking. There are significant gaps in capacity and the pool of qualified staff is limited. The country’s ranking on the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) has declined steadily since 2005 to 156th of 176 countries in 2012.
There has been some progress in instituting laws and regulations to improve the overall governance environment - including passage of a Right to access to information (RAI) law and registering a fifth largest increase in the world in its score in the Open Budget Index (OBI) from 10 to 25 - between 2008 and 2010. But serious challenges remain.
The national anti-corruption strategy was developed after significant diagnostic work and country-wide stakeholder consultations. It was launched in 2010 and rests on the following three pillars:
° Prevention: Preventive measures to minimize opportunities for corruption;
° Investigation: Effective investigation of reported corruption cases; and
° Education: Educating and raising awareness amongst citizens for building constituencies and alliances to fight both grand and petty corruption.
However, the implementation of this strategy has been far from satisfactory because of several political, institutional and legal constraints, inter-alia:
° Immunity: There is immunity for high-level government officials under Section 10 of Law no. 6 of 1995, under which no official on the rank of Vice Minister or above, can be prosecuted or tried for any action done in discharge of their official duties unless by a decree by the President of the Republic or a suggestion of one-fifth (1/5) of the members of the parliament and endorsement of two third (2/3) of the members of the parliament. This provision also applies to corruption offences under Article 4 of the Law. As a result of this provision, no senior official has ever been prosecuted or punished in a corruption case since unification between the South and the North of Yemen in 1990.
° SNACC effectiveness: The Supreme National Authority for Combating Corruption (SNACC) was established by Law no. 39 of 2006 and is supposed to receive corruption related complaints, make preliminary investigations, and submit its findings to the Attorney General Office (AGO), which is the authorized agency for conducting investigations into all crimes under National Law no. 13 of 1994 on Penal Procedures. This undermines the importance of SNACC because its investigation reports are subjected to scrutiny by the AGO, which usually conducts fresh investigations and does not necessarily reach the same conclusion as SNACC’s. Thus, SNACC is unable to serve as an effective independent investigative agency for corruption cases.
° Limitation to judicial competence for corruption crimes: As per Article (37) of Law no. 39 of 2006, the competence of judging in corruption crimes is limited to Public Fund Prosecution and Courts. However, many times a corruption case does not deal with public property or funds, and a case related with public funds or property does not involve corruption. As a result, the corruption cases do not get sufficient attention for a speedy trial.
° Negligible penalties for civil service corruption: The Civil Service Law provides for administrative sanctions in cases of corruption, but in a study done under the Bank's Technical Assistance, it was discovered that from amongst 165 employees convicted in a corruption crime between 2005 and 2007, no administrative action was taken by the concerned line ministry or the civil service ministry. This sets a very bad example and makes a mockery of the legal system. No one feels threatened in committing a corruption crime as they know that first of all, they will not be caught, and if caught, they will likely not be punished, and in any case, if they are given punishment, it will not be enforced.
° Limited use of HATC website for publishing bids: The High Authority for Tender Control (HATC) has launched a website on which procurement agencies are required to publish their bidding opportunities. However, in absence of a strong enforcement mechanism, agencies publishing their bidding opportunities are estimated to be only 20-30 percent.
° Some spending agencies doing procurement not within their threshold: For procurement above the national threshold of YER 250 million, the High Tender Board (HTB) is the procurement agency of the government to which, all spending agencies should send their procurement proposals. However, it has been observed that all spending units are not sending their proposals for procurement to the HTB and doing at their own levels.
° Independence of COCA Chairman: The Chairperson of Central Organization for Control and Audit (COCA) is appointed by the President and his minimum tenure is not fixed, thereby compromising his independence. Although all government agencies are under the jurisdiction of COCA's external audit and none are exempted under law, historically, few agencies including economic units constituting significant percentage of the state budget are not audited.
To address these issues, the Government of Yemen, in the Riyadh Donor Conference, on September 4, 2012, endorsed a Mutual Accountability Framework (MAF) with Development Partners (DP), which was later approved by the Council of Ministers on September 18, 2012. Under the MAF, amongst other things, the Government has committed to take the necessary steps for investigation, prosecution and trial of high officials charged with corruption, initiate administrative action against civil servants against whom competent courts have issued conviction orders, ensure autonomy of the SNACC and establish an Anti-Corruption Court (ACC), observe budget transparency – including revenues from oil and gas and other natural resources, initiate practical steps towards realizing the autonomy of COCA, observe independent and transparent merit-based recruitment through vetting process of senior civil service appointments, implement the program to remove ghost workers and double dippers in the civil service system including the military and security, release those that have been detained without charges, the Development Partners (DP), on their part, have committed to provide financial and technical assistance to support public accountability, anti-corruption and human rights.
The Good Governance Working Group (GGWG) of the National Dialogue Conference (NDC) has agreed with the principles behind these policy/ legislative decisions and has included them in their recommended principles on which the new constitution will be drafted. The Ministry of Legal Affairs (MoLA) plans to present these legal amendments to the legislature, while the constitutional drafting committee will work on the constitution in parallel.
It is uncertain at this juncture, by when the NDC would conclude its recommendations due to a lack of consensus on four issues – (a) structure of state – Central versus Federal, (b) form of democracy – Presidential versus Parliamentary form of democracy, (c) the ‘Southern’ issue – whether to have a separate country, and, (d) the ‘Saada’ issue – whether to be declared an autonomous region within Yemen. Therefore, the time frame within which NDC would conclude its recommendations and the drafting of new constitution will commence and conclude is uncertain. Consequently, the timing of the drafting of the new electoral law consistent with the new constitution, and subsequent elections for the President and Parliament are unclear. Hence, there is an agreement amongst the NDC and key decision makers in the government that amendments to existing legislations need not wait until the promulgation of new constitution and elections to the Parliament.
Under the National Dialogue Conference, the second phase of plenary session was held in Sana’a during June 8 to July 8, 2013. All political and social constituencies represented in the Conference participated in this Plenary, during which, reports of different Working Groups were presented, reviewed, commented on, and enriched. The Good Governance Working Group, amongst other things, made following major recommendations , which are consistent with the principles of TACAP, and endorsed by the Plenary session:
° The Constitution should provide that no amnesty should be given to senior State and government officials and to hold everyone to accountability, with absolutely no immunity in corruption crimes and crimes against public rights and shall not be abolished by passage of time.
° The Constitution should provide for the independence and transparency of control organizations and mandates publications of their reports.
° The Constitution should criminalize violations in government tenders and procurements and provide for controls and deterrent penalties.
° The Constitution shall guarantee the right of association for the people in political parties and civil society organization to promote the free will of the people.
This operation will support the government in preparing the legal amendments and policy decisions in respect of Legal/Policy decisions 1-6 and 8. The operation will also directly support in the implementation of Policy decisions 1-4. Complementary projects, especially the World Bank assisted Public Finance Modernization Project, will support the preparation of Policy Decision 7 and in implementing Policy Decisions 5-8. In addition, the project will also support the implementation of the newly-adopted Law on Right to Access of Information.
11. Alignment with Transition Fund Objective
This proposal aligns with the Transition Fund’s objective of “Enhancing Economic Governance.” Yemen is a transition country member, which is perceived to be one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Even with the most efficient and transparent management of public finances, development outcomes would not be achieved if corruption goes unchecked. Therefore the proposed project will support three governance and anti-corruption entities in Yemen. They are: (i) Supreme National Authority for Combating Corruption (SNACC), (ii) Information Commission, and (iii) Yemen Civil Societies Coalition Against Corruption Coalition (CSCAC).SNACC is the independent oversight body over the executive in regard to corruption. It has the mandate to take measures to prevent and investigate corruption cases. The proposed support to SNACC would help in modifying business processes in the targeted 6 sectors (health, education, water, civil service, social protection and judiciary) to prevent the avenues of corruption and would establish mechanisms and capacities to strengthen a more effective investigation. These steps would enhance the accountability within the civil service.
The Information Commission was established under Law No. 13 of 2012 on “The Right to Access to Information,” considered one of the best in the region. The proposed support will help the Commission to develop by-laws and a sustainable implementation plan, including identification of the internal government agency that will be charged with implementation and continuous oversight, budget projections for implementation, and training plans. It will also train public officials on their obligations under the law. These activities to ensure increased transparency, thereby enabling citizens hold government officials accountable.
CSCAC comprises of 16 CSOs with a common goal to combat corruption. The CSCAC would help in enhancing the accountability of the government in the targeted 7 sectors from the demand side. The identification, documentation and dissemination of case studies of corruption would put pressure on the government to take preventive and punitive actions. This would contribute to a reduction in the leakages of public finances in the targeted 7 sectors.
12. Alignment with Country’s National Strategy