PETALING JAYA: Malaysia needs more than just integrity oaths and policies that come about every few years, says Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) criminologist P Sundramoorthy.
He said this is nothing new for civil servants as they are regulated by general orders from the public service department (PSD).
Sundramoorthy said that over the years, civil servants have been subjected to many oaths that remind them that they must follow all rules and regulations and adhere to high standards of ethics and integrity.
“So if the government wants to implement a new oath for them and the vendors involved, there must be consequences to it.
“It’s not just signing a paper, as we have done much signing of such statements previously,” he told FMT.
The government has decided to introduce an integrity pact for all civil servants who are directly or indirectly involved in dealing with procurement or offer of projects and contracts, a move which requires them to make anti-graft declarations.
The Treasury, which released a circular on the introduction of this integrity pact, said it is aimed at eradicating corruption and eliminating abuse of power
Sundramoorthy said: “Just signing this piece of paper and saying ‘yes, I will abide by all of this’ won’t make a difference. If that is the purpose of this pact, is it even worth implementing?”
He said one way to eradicate corruption is to hire the right personality for jobs in the civil service and conduct psychometric tests before hiring.
“The psychometric test can be done to ascertain people with high levels of ethics and integrity. It is not foolproof but at least you can eliminate candidates that are non-desirable and are more prone to corruption and other criminal acts.
“The other thing is punishment. We need to punish the people who practise corruption severely,” he said, adding that there are calls by certain segments of society to include whipping in relation to corruption cases, despite protests from human rights groups.
Sundramoorthy also said ethics and integrity are values that are almost non-existent in Malaysian culture.
“Many young people think that being involved in a corrupt act is acceptable as long as both parties are willing. For example, you can buy your way out of traffic violations.
“We can only curb this by educating people from a young age. You can’t wait until they start working and then make them sign all the statements. That doesn’t work,” he said.
He said those who offer bribes must face similar consequences.
“You cannot just use them as prosecution witnesses. Sometimes, the givers initiate the process, so they must also face severe punishments.
“There are more than a million civil servants in our country. By taking action – whether by terminating their services or filing criminal charges against them – the civil service won’t come to a halt.
“In fact, if anything, it brings greater good than harm to the civil service by eliminating these people,” he said.
Meanwhile, Center to Combat Corruption and Cronyism (C4) executive director Cynthia Gabriel said the whole concept of integrity pacts to curb corruption and abuse of power in the civil service is “useless”.
Instead, she said, legally binding pacts and a revamped Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) with transparent appointments will work better in addressing corruption in the civil service.
“Public institutions should act with integrity and without fear and favour to any parties.
“There should also be real whistleblower laws that can facilitate reporting of malpractice in the civil service as well as better procurement laws,” she told FMT.
More importantly, she said, there must be proper enforcement to see this through.- FMT
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