February 2008
Judging from the gushing praises, Chief Secretary Sidek Hassan is
performing miracles with his Special Task Force to Facilitate Business
(Pemudah, its Malay acronym) committee to streamline the civil service.
A reality check is in order.
It reflects how out of touch our top civil servants are from
the realities on the ground that it took Sidek and his Director-General
of the Public Service Department Ismail Adam to make an unannounced visit
to a District Office in Selangor for them to realize how difficult it is
to pay one's "quit rent."
Then they were shocked to find that the District Officer was
out of his office. Again that reflects their naivety and ignorance of
the current sorry state of the government machinery. Perhaps they put
too much faith on the recent glowing report of IMD's World Competitive
Yearbook that placed the Malaysian government ahead of Japan and Germany
in terms of efficiency. The Malaysian public knows better.
It is pathetic that these top civil servants are reduced to
being chief clerks checking on the keranis (junior clerks) to make sure
that they are at their desks attending to their customers.
Sidek's unannounced visit is now fast becoming a legend, of a
meticulous and diligent top civil servant paying attention to the
smallest of operational details. Even previously cynical commentators
are now heaping praises on the man. This chorus is repeated by the
seasoned corporate figures co-opted into Pemudah.
If those corporate figures were truly impressed, then it does
not say much of the crispness of their own management. Alternatively,
they had such low expectations that any improvement would impress them.
My hunch is that their praises are nothing more than shrewd maneuverings
to be on the good side of the government. In a country where the nexus
between government and private sector is fuzzy, this is expected. It
would not surprise me that their companies do substantial business with
the government.
Interestingly, although Sidek had been interviewed umpteen
times, no one asked what disciplinary actions (if any) he took against
that errant District Officer and, more importantly, his immediate
superior.
If past experience is any guide, the poor underpaid kerani
would bear the heaviest punishment, with the District Officer reassigned,
and his immediate superior left untouched.
Misplaced Emphasis on Process Instead of Policy
Pemudah's emphasis has been exclusively on administrative processes. It
reflects the deep rot that a simple procedure that would have been simple
only a decade or two ago would today be tortuous and drawn out.
Nonetheless that does not stop Pemudah from trumpeting its easy
victories. These administrative details should have been streamlined at
the mid management level; they are essentially staff work.
What Sidek should be doing is to teach those middle manages
how to identify, analyze, and solve their problems. That would have been
far more effective than surprise visits and issuing edicts from high
above. Sidek could not possibly know the operational problems at the
various land offices; the issues in Ulu Selangor would be very different
from that at Petaling Jaya. With the urban and more educated clients at
Petaling Jaya they could try on-line payments, for example. That would
not be possible in Ulu Selangor.
Tun Razak hired the American consultant Milton Esman in the
1970s to spruce up the civil service. Esman's personal accounts are
highly illuminating. For example, during his first meeting with our top
civil servants, he was confounded that they behaved like little school
kids. Their attitude was: "You are the expert; you tell us what to do!"
At Treasury, he asked them their major issues. Their
immediate response: "Overworked and understaffed!" They could also have
added, "Underpaid!"
They complained of the volumes of vouchers they had to
scrutinize. Esman suggested that they study the bills they had already
processed and group them by their face value. To their surprise, a
substantial portion of the vouchers were under a certain amount, and
those were routinely paid without further auditing. Esman suggested if
they were to henceforth make a policy that all such bills be routinely
paid or better yet, authorize the various departments to pay them without
referral to Treasury, their work load would be reduced considerably. They
would then have extra time to scrutinize the important big bills. As for
the smaller vouchers, all they need would be to do random checks for
quality control.
Through such exercises Esman taught those civil servants how
to isolate and solve their problems. It was far more effective than
lecturing and making surprise visits. Oh yes, Esman did not spend his
time giving press interviews!
On a more substantive matter, by the time civil servants reach
the top, certainly at the Secretary-General and Director-General levels,
their concerns should not be staff, administrative, or operational
details rather with policy analysis and policy making.
Consider the government's recent decision to restrict the sale
of subsidized essential goods to non-Malaysians. Such policies should
first be vetted by senior civil servants, addressing such issues as their
practicality and cost of implementation. Does that mean that we now have
to show our passports or identity cards to shop? What about citizens
buying for their non-citizen neighbors?
Similarly with the graduate employment scheme; what are the
social, economic and other consequences for the government to assume the
role of employer of last resort? Egypt has such a policy; it now has one
of the most bloated and inefficient civil service, as well as a university
system totally unresponsive to the needs of the marketplace.
Sidek Hassan and his colleagues should be studying and
recommending solutions to the cabinet on the impact of the current
American credit crunch and impending recession, not checking the time
cards of clerks in a district office in Ulu Selangor.
Ambrin Buang, Not Sidek Hassan, The True Hero
Sidek need not look far to find examples of excellence; he could find it
within his own civil service, specifically in the exemplary performance
of Auditor-General Ambrin Buang.
Ambrin could have reduced himself to simply doing the
traditional "bean counting" activities, of making sure that there are
receipts for expenditures and other accounting minutiae. Make no
mistake, those are essential details. The greater fallacy would be to
assume that those are the only or even major duties of an auditor.
It reflects the diligence and professionalism of Ambrin that
his Annual Report regularly grabs headlines. It also says much about our
politicians and civil servants that they do not read those reports. He is
not at all bashful in commenting on such boondoggles as the Sports
Ministry's planned facility in London as well as the RM50 screwdrivers.
Ambrin's report gives a far more accurate (and depressing)
picture of the sorry state of the government machinery, certainly far
more realistic than that depicted by the IMD Yearbook or Pemudah's too
frequent glowing press releases. It is also revealing that Ambrin is not
a member of Pemudah.
An insight on organizational behaviors is that public
institutions, in particular the civil service, are not there to serve the
citizens. Instead these institutions serve their own self interest while
attempting to put a public face to it.
Recent policy initiatives as restricting the sale of
subsidized items only to citizens and graduate employment scheme serve
nothing more than to expand an already bloated civil service. The
currency among civil servants is the size of their respective departments
as measured by the number of employees and budget allocations, not whether
certain policies would ease poverty or improve the education system.
The wisdom and success of President Reagan and Prime Minister
Margaret Thatcher was their recognition of this essential truism. The
folly of the Abdullah Administration is its naivety in believing that
what is good for the civil service is good for Malaysia and Malaysians.
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