Board of Audit and Inspection to Conduct Public Corruption Investigation Office Audit This Year... Review Scheduled for Next Month 1st

Including the Corruption Investigation Office in the Annual Plan and Reporting to the Audit Committee

The Board of Audit and Inspection (BAI) will conduct an audit of the High-ranking Officials' Crime Investigation Agency (HOCIA) this year.

On the 30th, the BAI announced that it included HOCIA in the list of regular audit target institutions in the '2024 Annual Audit Plan' recently reported to the audit commissioners.

The BAI Secretariat explained the reason for the audit, stating, "There have been many evaluations from various sectors such as the media and legal circles that even though three years have passed since HOCIA's launch and its first term has ended, its functions and roles have not been properly established. We judged that it is necessary to diagnose this."

It added, "To also examine the appropriateness of the overall administrative operations of HOCIA, we have established an audit plan for HOCIA in accordance with the audit cycle (two years) for HOCIA," and "this will be reviewed by the Audit Committee on the 1st of next month." The audit plan prepared and reported by the BAI Secretariat must be approved by the Audit Committee to be finalized.

Previously, the BAI included HOCIA in the 2022 Annual Audit Plan and conducted an on-site audit in the second half of the year. The audit results of HOCIA were announced in July of last year.

Some express concerns that entering an audit less than a year after the announcement of the HOCIA audit results, while BAI officials including Chairman Choi Jae-hae and Secretary-General Yoo Byung-ho are under investigation by HOCIA over allegations of a targeted audit against former Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission Chairperson Jeon Hyun-hee, could raise questions about neutrality.

Regarding this, a BAI official said, "If the audit is conducted on a two-year cycle, there is inevitably about a one-year gap between the previous audit result announcement and the start of this audit," and added, "This is just a routine audit task."

Meanwhile, HOCIA, currently experiencing a leadership vacuum with former Chief Kim Jin-wook and former Deputy Chief Yeo Woon-guk both having retired, has yet to reach a conclusion on the investigation into the 'targeted audit allegations.'