Riyadh: The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s Oversight and Anti-Corruption Commission, known as “Nazaha”, arrested 1,708 individuals, including government employees, on charges of corruption during the year 2024.
The arrests were made after the state anti-corruption watchdog had conducted 4,000 investigations and more than 37,124 inspection tours across the Kingdom.
As per a report by Arabic daily Akhbar 24, during the Haj 2024 season, Nazaha alone conducted 9,600 inspection trips at the holy sites and Haj service agencies, arresting 155 people after conducting 382 investigations.
The crimes of persons implicated in corruption cases varied from bribery, abuse of official influence, money laundering, and forgeries.
Employees accused of crimes worked in various ministries, including Interior, National Guard, Defense, Justice, Education, Health, Housing, Human Resources, Commerce, Transport, Logistics, Culture, General Authority for Statistics, Zakat, Tax and Customs Authority.
The Nazaha is implementing King Salman bin Abdulaziz and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s directives to combat corruption, uphold justice, and improve transparency in line with the Kingdom’s Vision 2030.
Over the past few years, numerous state employees and entrepreneurs have been arrested and interrogated in the Kingdom for alleged fraudulent activities and public money misuse.
Saudi Arabia has been ranked 53 out of 180 countries by Transparency International for a clean business environment.
