Be Careful With Civil Service Appointments This Time.
The headline in Bernama this morning is - Vacancies In Civil Service To Be Filled As Quickly As Possible.
Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has instructed the Public Service Department (PSD) and Public Service Commission (PSC) to fill the thousands of vacancies in the civil service as quickly as possible by recruiting from among jobless graduates. He said the government needed more manpower to boost its capacity to implement and monitor programmes and projects under the Ninth Malaysia Plan (9MP). "If the graduates have to undergo training relevant to the needs of the departments and agencies concerned, that can be arranged," he added.
He said the vacancies existed at both the management and supporting staff levels. "The vacancies are many. However, it is up to the PSD to decide whether to fill all or only some of the vacancies after discussions with the ministries concerned," he said.
**** Great news for the unemployed graduates I'm sure. However the Prime Minister had better add this clause. That both the PSD and the PSC exercise greater caution this time around to see that a proportional number of non-Malays are also selected to fill the vacancies. Not just at the office-boy level but at the top management too.
The PM being a former civil servant himself must surely know how lopsided the public service is today. Ever since the Mahathir era 'Isi Penuh' exercises the Malays have literally 'flooded' the service. This is a very unhealthy development and directly leads to the segregation of our citizens at an official level. Mistakes like this ( and let me reiterate, it was and is a mistake to have a racially one-sided service), all for the sake of political expediency, should not be repeated or perpetuated.
It has led to the mediocrity of the service itself and badly needs the talents and genius of the non-Malays to bring it back to the days of a highly regarded and professional public service. If this sounds like an indictment, so be it. Ever since the early eighties the civil service has been politicized by the government to suit its own ends and this nearly boomeranged when the Anwar Ibrahim drama of 1998 emerged. The all Malay civil service did not know or want to know how to separate their official duties and responsibilities from their own personal and political leanings. The impartiality and neutrality of the civil service teetered and I'm sure that even now no politician will fully trust Malay civil servants not to have any anti-government sentiments or indulge in such activities. This is the price you pay for trying to be homogeneous.
At the height of the Anwar problem it was almost comical when Malay government servants used to whisper to each other all their anti-government conversation lest their 'pro-government' non-Malay counterparts overheard them! This is no exaggeration. If push had come to shove, it would have been the non-Malay public servants at that time who would have realized their responsibility and come down on the side of the government of the day.
So Prime Minister, please tell the bigshots at the PSD and the PSC to be extra careful this time, not to give in to narrow parochial sentiments, have the larger interest of the country and the service at heart and to remind them that if they make the correct decision now, then it will be the citizens who shall reap the benefits of a truly world-class public service.
Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has instructed the Public Service Department (PSD) and Public Service Commission (PSC) to fill the thousands of vacancies in the civil service as quickly as possible by recruiting from among jobless graduates. He said the government needed more manpower to boost its capacity to implement and monitor programmes and projects under the Ninth Malaysia Plan (9MP). "If the graduates have to undergo training relevant to the needs of the departments and agencies concerned, that can be arranged," he added.
He said the vacancies existed at both the management and supporting staff levels. "The vacancies are many. However, it is up to the PSD to decide whether to fill all or only some of the vacancies after discussions with the ministries concerned," he said.
**** Great news for the unemployed graduates I'm sure. However the Prime Minister had better add this clause. That both the PSD and the PSC exercise greater caution this time around to see that a proportional number of non-Malays are also selected to fill the vacancies. Not just at the office-boy level but at the top management too.
The PM being a former civil servant himself must surely know how lopsided the public service is today. Ever since the Mahathir era 'Isi Penuh' exercises the Malays have literally 'flooded' the service. This is a very unhealthy development and directly leads to the segregation of our citizens at an official level. Mistakes like this ( and let me reiterate, it was and is a mistake to have a racially one-sided service), all for the sake of political expediency, should not be repeated or perpetuated.
It has led to the mediocrity of the service itself and badly needs the talents and genius of the non-Malays to bring it back to the days of a highly regarded and professional public service. If this sounds like an indictment, so be it. Ever since the early eighties the civil service has been politicized by the government to suit its own ends and this nearly boomeranged when the Anwar Ibrahim drama of 1998 emerged. The all Malay civil service did not know or want to know how to separate their official duties and responsibilities from their own personal and political leanings. The impartiality and neutrality of the civil service teetered and I'm sure that even now no politician will fully trust Malay civil servants not to have any anti-government sentiments or indulge in such activities. This is the price you pay for trying to be homogeneous.
At the height of the Anwar problem it was almost comical when Malay government servants used to whisper to each other all their anti-government conversation lest their 'pro-government' non-Malay counterparts overheard them! This is no exaggeration. If push had come to shove, it would have been the non-Malay public servants at that time who would have realized their responsibility and come down on the side of the government of the day.
So Prime Minister, please tell the bigshots at the PSD and the PSC to be extra careful this time, not to give in to narrow parochial sentiments, have the larger interest of the country and the service at heart and to remind them that if they make the correct decision now, then it will be the citizens who shall reap the benefits of a truly world-class public service.
posted by The Malaysian. at 6/03/2006 01:12:00 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home