Since it was established in 1974, the Independent Commission Against Corruption has been making Announcements of Public Interest or APIs to publicise its anti-graft messages.
ICAC Principal Mass Communication Officer Helen Lee has been the creative force behind several of the adverts. She explained that the campaigns do not address specific incidents, but are tailor-made to reflect the concerns of that era.
"We'll consider the corruption trend and study the annual opinion survey conducted by the ICAC to formulate the advertising themes, the messages that we are going to deliver and also the presentation style of the API," Ms Lee said.
The beginning
The agency's first campaign in 1975, Hawker featured a mother with her young children rushing to the ICAC offices to file a corruption complaint after she became a victim of extortion.
"In the 1960s and 70s, corruption was very serious, it was almost a way of life, most of our APIs in those days were on how corruption affects society, while also encouraging people to report corruption to the ICAC," Ms Lee noted.
By the 1980s and 90s, Hong Kong's business sector was developing rapidly. "That's why we produced a number of APIs targeting the issue of business corruption."
One of those APIs called The Knock carried the message that a person could lose everything, including their house and family if they engaged in corrupt activities.
A new era
By the time Hong Kong entered the new millennium, Ms Lee said corruption had moved underground and had become increasingly difficult to detect.
"We produced a series of APIs on the theme of 'partnership' because we have to rely on the public to report to the ICAC and join hands with us to fight corruption."
One of the anti-graft body's millennium campaigns focused on clean elections, with an API titled: Wash Hand.
"In elections, if you accept money your hands will become dirty and no matter how much you wash your hands, they will still be dirty," Ms Lee explained.
To move with the times, the ICAC devised interactive, high-tech methods of getting its message across. The palm print campaign encourages visitors to the agency's headquarters in North Point to use touch-screen TVs to view its ads. The palm prints symbolise the community joining hands with the ICAC to report graft.
Back to basics
In keeping with the slogan: "A clean future for our next generation," the decision was made to feature babies as a theme again for the millennium. This time, the ad was based on predicting a newborn's future potential in a clean and fair society.
"How can we ask babies aged four to six months to react? We just rolled our camera. Some played, some cried, some slept, and in post-production we assigned them their occupations, so a baby who was laughing we labelled her a singer, while the baby who licked her fingers was dubbed a food critic, so it wasn't that difficult after all."
Producing the Babies TV spot turned out to be Ms Lee's most gratifying project, because she believes it reflects current sentiment.
"Only in a fair, clean environment can we achieve our goals, so a clean future for our next generation is very important," she said.
