Prudential Cambodia Life Assurance yesterday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Kingdom’s Ant-Corruption Unit (ACU), pledging to fight corruption in Cambodia.

The agreement commits Prudential Cambodia, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Prudential Corporation Asia, to standards of transparency, anti-bribery and staff training to prevent corruption. Prudential will have direct communication with the ACU and a commitment that the corruption body will respond when called upon.

“The ACU will act according to the content of the MOU to protect the companies who sign the MOU with us. We protect them for being asked for more money than they need to pay for seeking public service,” said ACU vice president Kheang Seng. “So the company can complain to us and we will act immediately on the case,” he added.

Prudential are the second major company to sign an agreement with ACU following in the footsteps of soft drink giant Coca Cola, who signed on in December.

Seng said yesterday that the signing should encourage more firms, both local and foreign, to sign an agreement with the ACU.

The ACU vice president said that other companies would still receive the same treatment from his unit, but signing up with them helped validate the company’s anti-corruption stance.

“It is like their second protection shirt. The company who wants to sign an MOU with us is likely clean within themselves already. They sign this MOU to protect themselves from being a victim of corruption,” he said.

Prudential chief executive Panjak Banerjee said the agreement demonstrates his company’s commitment to fight corruption and should encourage more companies to do the same.

“Cambodia’s economy has had remarkable success in the past 15 years and continues to grow very strongly,” Banerjee said. “While we remain optimistic about the future, we are also encouraged to witness the government taking visible and important steps in making the business environment to be more efficient and effective,” he said.