– Enhance the convenience of the people by integrating non-emergency consultation calls to 110, and expanding the platform of people’s rights and interests with the artificial intelligence

– Strengthen the petition handling process by establishing the “Conflict Mediation Consultation Council” and managing “Civil Consultation for Unusual Petitions”

– Work for the dissemination of anti-corruption culture by building an integrity education curriculum in universities

The 2026 budget of the Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission (ACRC, Acting Chairperson Han Sam Suk) has been confirmed as KRW 111.7B, up 6.6B from last year’s 105.1B.

The ACRC has allocated the budget under the three strategic goals for President Lee’s administrative vision “People-centered country, where everyone is happy,” which are: resolve people’s grievances by proactive and practical response; institutional improvement based on the people’s voice, and resolve grievances through administrative appeal; and update anti-corruption laws and regulations and disseminate the culture of integrity.

Key items for the budget of the Commission are as follows:

First, allocate a budget for integrating non-emergency consultation calls to 100 to address the people’s inconvenience. The ACRC will gradually expand the integration and connection service to 697 institutions from today’s 150, so people can be relayed to the most adequate consultation number once they call 100. At the same time, the representative numbers of central administration agencies will be also streamlined to 100 for easier and more convenient consultation.

※ Integration of non-emergency consultation calls to 110: newly allocate KRW 4.93B (2026)

Second, work for the platform for people’s rights and interests to equip with the AI technology for easier petition filing and efficient petition handling. Under this goal, the present e-People platform will adopt AI technology to provide real-time conversational petition services* from 2027, and support agile petition handling by prioritizing safety and disaster-related emergency petitions and automatically merging repeated petitions.

* AI model dedicated for petitions which communicates with the petitioner like a chatbot

※ Communication system, including establishment of AI-based platform: KRW 3.35B (2025) → 3.9B (2026, up by 16.4%)

Third, actively address collective complaints and unusual complaints which cause massive amounts of social costs by increasing the budget for the collective complaints handling system for the overall government such as building the “Conflict Mediation Consultation Council” and operating “Civil Consultation for Unusual Complaints.” Moreover, support for the civil grievance handling commissions located in local governments will be strengthened to vitalize local ombudsmen to focus the commission’s capacity for the thorough relief of people’s rights and interests.

※ Intestigative activity for grievance petitions: KRW 1.6B (2025) → 1.9B (2026, up by 18.7%)

Fourth, strengthen integrity education for the younger generation to firmly settle the culture of integrity in society as a whole. The Commission will make integrity education mandatory so that the younger generation – students in primary, secondary, and universities – can naturally learn integrity and a sense of ethics from their early lifespan. At the same time, the ACRC will expand customized integrity education based on age group, including “on-site classroom for integrity experience” and “special classes for integrity courses in universities.”

※ Disseminate the culture of integrity including integrity education expansion: KRW 2.41B (2025) → 2.97B (2026, up by 23.1%)

Acting Chairperson Han of the ACRC said “The ACRC will prioritize addressing people’s grievances to continuously realize ‘people-centered country, a nation where everyone is happy’ and further endeavor for the Corruption Perceptions Index to be placed in the solid 20s.”