KUWAIT: Kuwait Transparency Society issued a statement to local media yesterday calling on His Highness the Prime Minister Sheikh Sabah Al-Khaled Al-Sabah to draft a law for greater transparency in hiring. KTS wants all candidates hired in senior administrative and financial positions at state departments to go through a more transparent process that will eliminate favoritism and is compatible with all international anticorruption requirements.

In the appeal, the non-government organizations blamed what they called 'weak auditory bodies' and 'corruption of the administrative and financial system in Kuwait' for various money laundering and other corruption-related crimes revealed recently in the country. "It has become a national duty for the head of the executive authority to eliminate administrative and financial corruption that has become prevalent in the country, due in part to a policy of appointing senior officials based on favoritism as opposed to competency," the statement reads.

"The recent events prove that the state's auditory bodies have failed to do their auditory role in accordance with internationally recognized standards and controls, which happened due to the lack of patriotic competencies with integrity in senior state posts."

The petition was signed by 28 Kuwaiti civil society organizations including Kuwait Transparency Society, Kuwait Society of Lawyers, Kuwait Association for Protecting Public Funds, Kuwait Accountants and Auditors Association and Kuwait Human Rights Society.