I'm still slightly concerned that both will take significant resources to set up and maintain; but if they succeed in saving money for the taxpayer, then one would hope they might pay their own way in a sustainable manner.

BOTH must get into top gear with almost immediate effect if they are to have a significant impact on graft and wastage and mechanisms must be put in place to ensure that these are minimised on all fronts.

Most importantly, they must be transparent, and not hide behind a cloak of secrecy, with 'confidential' reports that are completed at great cost, but never see the light of day.

After all, this is something we are familiar with in the probes and commissions of inquiry that have been held from time to time and whose reports and recommendations are already years old.

The country must get used to a culture of questioning in order to promote accountability, and these institutions must be in the forefront.

In the absence of such bodies, the media tend to perform at least some of the tasks required to promote good governance and transparency, but often their efforts are dismissed by those in Government who are not well-disposed to what they usually consider as the intrusive scrutiny of the press.

The anti-corruption commission, for example, must hold regular briefings on its work.

It must inform Namibians on the matters it is investigating, and it must report back on its findings once it has done so.

So too the council on State-owned enterprises, which needs to put in place rules and regulations for parastatals which must be adhered to at all costs.

Much of the groundwork for the latter was done in an earlier investigation into parastatals, and so it should require a fairly minimalist structure to deal with SOEs, rather than weighty bureaucracies, which will in turn swallow the very resources they are set in place to protect.

The anti-corruption commission will need, primarily, to be staffed by investigators, for this is the substance of what they need to do.

The director, if possible, also needs to have investigative capacity and be fearless in his or her approach to the issue of corruption, or we risk having this crucial institution headed by another suited bureaucrat who wants merely to curry favour with all who hold high office.

The council on SOEs need not necessarily be a fulltime body.

It is important that mechanisms be set in place for effective and cost-efficient ways of running parastatals, and thereafter the council need only meet from time to time.

And if we support the argument that 'justice delayed, is justice denied', then specific time frames must be given for the speedy resolution of investigations undertaken by the anti-corruption commission to avoid the huge costs of endless suspensions.

And of course, there is the question of payback.

Where officials are deemed to have stolen or misappropriated monies, ways and means must be found of getting it back.

And if the commission can succeed in doing this, if not all the time, then at least in a number of cases, it could end up paying for itself.

The commission must have the power to determine its own agenda, whether this be by means of whistleblowers who bring corrupt activities to their attention; or of their own volition; and to pick up on issues reported in the media.

There is already more than enough to get them started.

It must earn itself the reputation of being merciless when it comes to investigating public theft, and it must make it clear from the start that smaller issues which have taken up the time, for example, of the Ombudsman, such as unfair dismissals, are not part of their mandate.

For they will then occupy themselves with trivia, rather than probe deep-rooted corruption which has set into many facets of Government, whether at national, regional or municipal level.

The selection of a director for such a body is crucial, and will need to be closely scrutinised, if necessary by means of public hearings, for that person will need to take very seriously the job of guarding our national resources.

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