STOP 'EVOLVING' INTO BOXERS TO SCORE BROWNIE POINTS, POLITICIANS TOLD

By Sajad Hussein

KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 17 (Bernama) -- Politicians should refrain from 'evolving'
into boxers, Congress of Unions of Employees in the Public and Civil Services
(Cuepacs) secretary-general Ahmad Shah Mohd Zin said Tuesday.

They should not use the civil service as a punch bag to score brownie points
with their constituents, he said.

"Of late, it has become a fad for such politicians to criticise the civil
service, whenever they wanted to justify to their constituents, why certain
project were delayed or shelved.

"Most of the time, the delays were not due to the inefficiency of civil
servants but due to other factors beyond them.

"Thus, this 'blame game' must stop...lest, it demoralises the civil
servants.

"Cuepacs, being the umbrella body for the 1.2 million civil servants, is
very mindful of the role its members play in ensuring a smooth government
administration at all levels," he told Bernama.

Ahmad however, agreed that there was room for improvement in the delivery
system, and that civil servants across the country were doing their best to meet
set targets.

At times, we do make mistakes, but these are few and far between. What irks
us most is that these shortfalls were unnecessarily blown out of proportion,
sending a negative message to the people.

"However, our (overall) achievements which far outweigh these shortfalls
are seldom appreciated," he lamented.

He hoped the media could highlight the achievements of the civil service,
particularly in the last five years, adding that during that time, Cuepacs had
come a long way with marked improvement in the delivery system.

"The immigration, national registration, road transport, police and
judiciary departments have all improved their delivery system tremendously.

"The immigration department, for example, processed international passports
within two hours while the road transport department had put almost all its
services online, providing convenience to the public.

"The judiciary had also put in place a system to reduce the backlog of
cases while the police had succeeded in reducing crime with more patrols of
hot areas," he said.

Ahmad said there were many more departments in federal and state governments
which had also improved, but were usually not under public scrutiny as they had
little or no contact with them.

"Generally, I would say that the Malaysian civil service is one of the best
in this part of the world, and should be a pride of all Malaysians."

He assured that Cuepacs was constantly motivating civil servants to improve
the services provided and hoped the people, the media and the politicians, would
do their part.
-- BERNAMA


Attachments: