Prime Minister Najib Razak came into office promising to focus on domestic economic issues and political reform. In his maiden speech, Najib also pledged to conduct a comprehensive review of the much-criticized Internal Security Act, which allows for indefinite detention without trial.
In the speech, he emphasized his commitment to tackling poverty, restructuring Malaysian society, expanding access to quality education for all, and promoting renewed “passion for public service.” Najib then set out to implement his much hailed Government Transformation Programme (GTP).
He identified six major policy areas in which KPIs will play an especially important role in improving the effectiveness of the Malaysian government. These are known as National Key Result Areas (NKRAs). The NKRAs include crime prevention, reducing government corruption, increased access to quality education, improvements in the standard of living for low income groups, upgrades to rural infrastructure, and improvements in public transportation.
The NKRA for reducing government corruption is interesting. The official statement reads :
“The government is working to increase public trust in government, reduce fraud and waste in government procurement, and combat what it calls "grand corruption.
The government has begun prosecutions of elected officials and civil servants, regardless of party affiliation. Whistleblower legislation and improved transparency in government contracts are key components of this effort.
The government is also working to pass legislation to require those suspected of corruption to be brought to trial within one year. Performance will be assessed using Transparency International's Corruption Perception Index.”
Ignored the result
Take note of that last line, that performance will be assessed using Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index (CPI). And it is the CPI score for 2011 that has raised concern among Malaysians. Yet, it went totally unnoticed and unacknowledged by UMNO even though the report came during its annual assembly last week.
Najib, as UMNO president and architect of the GTP, pretended not to notice. Either he was too ashamed or it was another instance of his by now familiar irresponsibility and lack of accountability. Perhaps these traits have become amplified as pressure mounts on after failing to deliver anything substantial since taking over from Abdullah Badawi in April 2009.
What Najib did instead of facing up to the facts was to run off to hide behind Malay racism and supremacy in a speech to UMNO linked NGO Pekida, vowing not to give an inch and that Malay rights would always be supreme as long as there was UMNO, even at the expense of the other races.
Lackeys offer excuses
Worse still, his cohorts including minister Idris Jala began to discredit the CPI results. Whether he was man enough to admit his own failing, the fact is the Najib government went back on its own statement to use the CPI as a performance measure. And this did not go unnoticed by Tranparency International nor foreign investors, who are increasingly uncomfortable with his governance or lack of it.
"We realise, however, a lot more focus is needed on the initiatives to combat grand corruption. If anything, the CPI (Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index) has clearly shown that we need to address Grand Corruption as it impedes our overall CPI scoring. This issue requires institutional and structural reforms. The Government recognises this,” Idris' Pemandu unit said in a statement.
Idris then went on to blame the country’s dipping score on a new measure introduced - the Bribe’s Payers Index (BPI), yet the BPI is a separate and independent survey from the CPI. The blame does not rest on the BPI measure but instead it can safely be said, Malaysia did poorly in its reforms to eradicate corruption.
In fact, Malaysia's 60th placing from 37th in 2003 and 56th in 2009 is the worst in the country's history. This is also the 3rd consecutive year Malaysia has slipped in the CPI.
And the reasons? Look no farther than the various stumbling blocks installed by the Najib administration and to be fair, the past BN administrations especially during the Mahathir era, and even a novice would be able to tell why corruption is so hard to weed out in Malaysia.
To compound this lack of perseverance and to resort to desperate flip-flops when caught in a bind, Second Finance Minister Ahmad Husni then suggested that the ranking should not be taken 'too seriously'. He argued that the CPI rankings slide was “subjective” and “questionable”, saying that measures based on perception should not be used as an ultimate gauging method.
“It is subjective... Measuring is based on perception... We can use it to improve our position but we cannot say that is the end of everything. When you do comparisons based on interviewing different sets of people, it’s questionable. It’s hard to say, it is why we have been telling agencies involved to engage more with international bodies. Way we put it it’s based on perception...You are not interviewing same person, [it’s] different sets of persons in Malaysia, Thailand... it’s hard (to gauge),” said Husni.
No one likes a cheat
Firstly, what about when the Najib administration was drawing up its GTP mission and vision? Why did it choose to specifically state that "Performance will be assessed using Transparency International's Corruption Perception Index". Why wasn't it concerned about the methodology then?
Face it, no one likes a cheat. No investor like to come to a country which keeps changing the distance between the goal posts to suits its convenience. Remember Mahathir Mohamad and how he suddenly pulled the plug on investors by banning the trading of CLOB shares and making the ringgit non-tradeable in foreign markets? Remember how long it took before Malaysia could even crawl out from the being the pariah as far as big-time long-term FDI were concerned because of Mahathir's ill-advised policies?
The same is happening now. Ahmad Husni's statement contradicts the initial choice of using the CPI as a performance benchmark and is also downright confusing. If the CPI is subjective, then remove it as a performance benchmark and employ one that is more objective.
Furthermore, contrary to Husni's claims, it is right and logical to interview people who are outside of the Malaysian sphere, lest the response is biased, and additionally, the bigger the interview sample number the greater is the precision of the results. Ask any statistician. Most importantly, what is the point of the BN agencies claiming there is no corruption, but the rest of the nation and the global community says there is!
Free for all corruption
DAP adviser Lim Kit Siang put it in a nutshell when he summarized the following facts about Malaysia's CPI performance through the years.
“In the nine years from 1995 to 2003, Tun Dr Mahathir as Prime Minister saw Malaysia’s TI CPI score stuck in the narrow groove between 4.8 in 2000 to 5.32 in 1996 while the CPI ranking fell 14 places from No. 23 in 1995 to No. 37 in 2003. (10 is highly clean while 0 is highly corrupt) In the five-year premiership of Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, Malaysia’s TI CPI ranking fell 10 places from 37 in 2003 to 47 placing in 2008, while the CPI score stuck between 5.0 to 5.1," Kit Siang said in a statement.
"In his 2 ½ years as Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak presided over the worst TI CPI ranking and score for Malaysia on many fronts, viz: worst single-year plunge in TI CPI ranking of nine placings. i.e. fall from No. 47 in 2008 to No. 56 in 2009, most precipitous fall in TI CPI ranking in 2 ½ years under Najib’s premiership, falling 13 placings from No. 47 in 2008 to No. 60 in 2011; when in five years under Abdullah, Malaysia fell 10 places from No. 37 in 2003 to No. 47 in 2008 and in nine years under Mahathir, Malaysia fell 14 places from No. 23 in 1995 to No. 37 in 2003, in the past three years 2009 – 2011, the CPI score consistently falling below the score 5, when in first 14 years from 1995 to 2008, Malaysia had only twice fallen below the score of 5, viz: 4.8 in 2000 and 4.9 in 2002 and consecutively in the past three years 2009 – 2011, Malaysia’s CPI score falling to ever new lows, i.e. 4.5 for 2009, 4.4 for 2010 and 4.3 for 2011.”
Thus, it seems the NKRA for reducing government corruption under the GTP should get nothing less than a negative score - or F for Fail. Not only have we not improved, instead as the CPI ranking proves, we have regressed.This is a great failing on the part of Najib’s administration. The slide has to be addressed, yet no one in Najib’s camp wants to do talk about it except to badmouth the index and give excuses.
It was also telling that as the country plunged in graft, Najib and his UMNO cohorts were busily praising themselves and defending corruption. Not a single word would they tolerate against Women's minister Shahrizat Jalil, who family was accused of inappropriately spending RM181 million out of a RM250million government soft loan granted to the NFC cattle livestock breeding project.
In fact, the Deputy Inspector General of Police was trotted out to give her family a clean bill of health. This despite a wealth of documentary evidence that they had spent money on luxury condos, a Mercedes, bought residential land, transferred cash and gave huge discounts to family-owned firms.
If this goes on, Najib will surely not be remembered as he has vainly proclaimed himself 'Father of Transformation'. It seems that the more apt title should be the 'Father of Corruption'!
Malaysia Chronicle
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