Legal adeptness a must for civil servants — Legal counsel
KUCHING: Legal adeptness is a necessary skill for Sarawak civil servants, especially Residents, District Officers and Sarawak Administrative Officers, who have judicial rights to perform legal and statutory roles and duties as provided under relevant State Acts and Ordinances.
A four-day training programme, ‘Effective Execution of Legal and Statutory Functions in Resident’s and District Office ( R& DO)’, that began since Monday this week saw a total of 30 participants attending a training programme on legal competencies.
“Familiarise yourself with the process or the flow in the court proceedings, and be in control when conducting the court proceedings.” said senior state legal counsel Joseph Chioh, who is one of the facilitators of the programme, through a press statement yesterday.
Delivering a session at the training, Joseph reminded that a sentence must be given with grounds and the need to must justify the grounds to give a sentence to the accused.
“Always remember, a suspect is always innocent until proven guilty, so we must never go into assuming to become a good magistrate,” said Joseph.
The course is a first of its kind this year, for government officers to learn about legal and statutory duties assigned to administrative officers serving in Resident’s and District Offices in Sarawak.
“It is my hope that participants will be able to enhance greater awareness, understanding and knowledge on relevant statutes related to the powers and duties of Administrative Officers (as Magistrate, District Officer and Resident),” said chief operating officer of Leadership Institute, Segaren, during the programme.
“This training also seeks to enhance efficiency and effectiveness in executing judicial powers, statutory functions and duties based on procedures and requirement of the law, enabling them to perform duties and responsibilities with utmost integrity and accountability,” added Segaren.
The appointment and statutory duties of administrative officers in Resident’s and District Offices require systematic legal competency training to equip them with adequate knowledge, skills and ability to perform the job effectively according to procedures and requirement of the law.
“Legal competency has traditionally been valued in the SCS ( State Civil Service) as an essential skill to administer the court of law, especially at the Divisional and District level,” Segaren pointed out.
“While the previous Sarawak Administrative Officers were inducted into law subjects and exams as part of mandatory service requirement, the existing Administrative Officers need to equip themselves with sound legal competency and put into practice discharging legal and statutory duties effectively,” said Segaren.
On training programmes offered by the Leadership Institute, Segaren made it a point to continue to provide training that can help uplift the confidence of civil servants as he believes that the knowledge and skill can create a greater sense of motivation and lift their confidence. He also said, if they require more trainings in this area, the institute is committed to organise more trainings of this kind.
“You as magistrates must know the different types of charges and be able to find where the law is,” said Datu Romie Sigan, deputy chairman of Public Service Commission, who was specially invited to share his experiences as a former Resident of Betong.
Romie had spent most part of the four-day session sharing about his rich experience in handling court cases at the divisional level and shared many interesting stories.
“Remember, we always try to dispense justice and never the less,” said Romie.
“The mark of a (good) lawyer or magistrate is knowing the law and where to find it according to legal documents,” he further advised.
The course is part of the Leadership Institute’s flagship programme – High Performance Leadership ( HPL) programme. The programme covered a total of 10 topics namely, Introduction to Malaysian Legal System; Interpretation of Statutes; Principles of Administrative Law to name a few.
Administrative Officers and Assistant Administrative Officers serving in R& DO also had the opportunity to learn through case studies and a mock trial, which is a simulation of court proceeding, in a bid to enhance their ability in judicial and statutory knowledge and capacity.
Another facilitator was Henry Joseph, a legal practitioner who actively advises NGOs (nongovernmental organisations).
This training programme is organised by the Leadership Institute in collaboration with the State Human Resource Unit of Chief Minister’s Department and State Attorney- General’s Chambers.