Time to act and stop the rot
The Pakatan Harapan government has a massive task ahead to improve the civil service’s administration, delivery and execution of the new policies to benefit the nation.
THE media is now filled with news articles putting the civil service in the spotlight, including the recent allegations that some of these officers are sabotaging the new government and putting the machinery in a spot.
From appointees serving the new ministers being unpaid after three months to some posts of these aides being downgraded, the civil service, which is supposed to be loyal to the government of the day, has been accused of still supporting the previous prime minister.
It has also been said that some civil servants, or at least some officers, still cannot accept that some ministers in key portfolios are non-Malays.
But the reality is that our over 1.6 million civil service officials must change in the New Malaysia for a brighter and better tomorrow for all Malaysians.
Now that Pakatan Harapan has celebrated the first Merdeka celebration and completed the first 100 days, the reforms need to be introduced and implemented.
Pakatan’s challenge will be changing the civil service culture and mindset. Even Dr Tun Mahathir Mohamad has said that he had to deal with the problem of distrust.
“We cannot trust the civil servants because many of them were so committed to the last govern- ment that they actually campaigned for them, and they were known to have been corrupted by the previous government.
“On the one hand, I need somebody to work with because I need the machinery in the government. But when you cannot trust the machinery, you need to replace people. The replacements cannot come from the top-most rank, but from the bottom.
“The rot is so deep in the civil service that the new administration has trouble finding capable officers to replace the corrupt department heads,” Dr Mahathir was quoted as saying.
Only civil service reforms will change the administration, execution and management, for efficiency to set in so that the nation and people are served by a peopleminded civil service.
“The government machinery used to be clean and ran well. Now we find obstacles in our path, all kinds of obstacles,” Dr Mahathir said when he took over the government following the May 9 elections.
It was not what he had expected, he added: “We found that the government machinery was wholly ruined and all the ministries ruined because the policy was not to govern the country but to get opportunities.”
Changing the mindset of Malaysians to rebuild a new inclusive Malaysia is difficult, deputy Women, Family and Community Minister Hannah Yeoh had said during a Merdeka Day celebration.
As she put it, “Changing government is the easy part. Changing the mindset of the civil service is the hardest.”
Saying that the civil service is broken and not taking action against the government officials is a greater mistake.
Only taking action against indiscipline will be a reminder to the civil service to stop the rot or any sabotage from within.
Only serious actions against civil servants who have failed in their duties will send a reminder to the current officials that they cannot be inefficient or corrupt anymore.
It is not only the duty of the government, but also the public to play a constructive role by highlighting corrupt and inefficient officials.
Having been a civil servant from 1969 to 1979, I am aware that there are several provisions for disciplinary action by the authorities (Public Services Department and Commission).
Several steps can be instituted to take disciplinary action against government officials by the newly appointed Chief Secretary to the Government (KSN) spearheading a civil service reform body to review and take action against all corrupt and inefficient officials.
The Public Services Department (PSD) and its Commission, together with the MACC, can be the change agent in getting the civil service cleaned up.
The new KSN must instruct the PSD to take action immediately and discipline them through proper inquiry, institute transfers, dismissals and salary deductions.
Improvements to the civil service can be done in several ways.
1) The disciplinary board under the PSD must act immediately to take disciplinary action against all officials who abused their position.
2) PSD must table findings to the Public Services Commission recommending dismissal.
3) The KSN must then table a recommendation that inefficient officials be dismissed in the public interest and denied all pension privileges.
In a particular misappropriation of funds case, a full enquiry must be held on all treasury officers related to the offence. They must be called up and explain how and why refunds were not made to more than 1.6 million taxpayers. If found guilty, action must be taken and if retired, their pensions should be stopped.
The inquiry has the task of finding out who stalled the action to return refunds to more than
1.6 million taxpayers. Treasury officials, including the Finance Ministry secretary-general, must answer why basic bookkeeping procedures were not followed. The KSN must advise the Cabinet and Prime Minister on whether there was an element of criminality.
This is one high-profile case that affected many Malaysians. According to Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng, the former treasurergeneral did not heed the Inland Revenue Board’s (IRB) request to transfer the necessary monies to the Tax Refund Fund.
Lim revealed that the IRB had made the written request to the treasurer general in 2016, but the request was ignored.
He added that the previous administration had falsified accounts and misappropriated tax refunds for other purposes or covering up for the (budget) deficit to show a surplus.
IRB owed RM16bil in tax refunds, spanning back six years and involving 1.65 million cases. The Customs Department also revealed that it was unable to issue RM19.25bil in Goods and Services Tax refunds.
Police are probing both matters and have recorded statements from Lim. Since a police report has been lodged, the government may be considering legal action.
It is time to act. It is time for the government to fix a “broken” civil service by way of the provisions of disciplinary action through the civil service or the judiciary.
Dr Mahathir and the Cabinet have a massive task ahead to improve the civil service administration, delivery and execution of the new policies to benefit the nation.