Too many civil servants are either moonlighting or doing some side businesses
Government integrity is at stake
Malaysian civil servants are very lucky. During the Covid emergency they were guaranteed their salaries and even got a bonus. Just recently, civil servants got a 10 percent plus salary hike, something those working within the private sector must fight hard for.
In-fact, those civil servants over grade 56 should be considered as the part of the top echelon of salary earners in Malaysia. Together with their benefits and allowances, they are the real lucky ones.
However, many civil servants are not happy with this.
Many are conducting side businesses.
There are two categories.
The first category includes those who prepare and sell food in markets, Ramadan Bazaars, and conduct other “harmless” businesses outside their work. Some are very innovative, making soaps, artworks, and other things for Sunday markets etc. Most of the activities, unless they take up undue time are really just hobby businesses.
The second category is much more alarming and more widespread than many believe. Some civil services create specific vehicles to benefit from there position within the civil service. Examples of this would include the supplying of stationary, IT, or other equipment to the departments they work within. Some offer event management to the government. Others offer consulting to those who might want to deal with government. There are plenty of other examples. The common thread is that these activities profit from their positions within the civil service.
Unfortunately, some people within the senior echelons in government at both state and federal levels have turned this into a fine art, using think tanks as emissaries, facilitators, and intermediaries between private enterprise and government.
This is making the civil service, inefficient, bloated, and even dishonest to the oaths of office they made. If senior civil servants have time to undertake businesses outside their jobs, it’s the government and people who are missing out on efficiency and innovation.
This is an issue that has been discussed for more than 20 years. It was a pet issue of the DAP, who are silent today, when they are in government. As former DAP MP Wong Chen said, many of these side businesses can create conflicts of interest.
According to the public servant regulations, regulation 5 says public servants are prohibited from,
directly or indirectly participate in any commercial, agricultural, or industrial enterprise
seek paid work from any private institution, company, firm, or individual.
provide paid or free expert reports or opinions
serve as a trustee, administrator, or receiver
However, this can be exempted. For far too long a blind eye has been given to civil servants running their side businesses.
This is a small area which can be looked at to end corruption and improve efficiency and integrity of the civil service.
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As a continuous effort of the blogger to highlight the complex challenges facing the government machinery but not much concrete solution, I will do my part as a concerned citizen to offer a solution both long term and short term that really works.
The 1.5 million civil servants employed by the government, from the minister , head of department, director general, and so on down the corporate hierarchy in various branches of the government agriculture, judiciary, police, custom or education are populated with human beings. These ones have inherited all kind of values, mind-set, attitude and idiosyncrasies and peculiarities which are hard to reform or change.
Transformation of the mind has to come from within. No amount of laws from without can correct the long acquired habits from education or environment. Such as prejudice, greed, laziness or tendency to corruption can effectively eliminated from external motivation or force. Many columnists in the media have been very good in pointing out the urgency to reform and change human behavior but meet with little success . As people are resistant to change and it is a waste of time and resources to attempt to reform people.
Our only hope to effect change is from the womb. Unborn soul in the womb has no negative elements such as fear, doubt, bias, low self esteem or anything else that hinders the learning process. The class room of the womb is the best place to learn everything about life. A child who has been taught how to learn from the class room of the womb is a child prodigy destined for greatness after birth.
The wisdom of starting to nurture virtues must begin from the beginning of birth “Plan for what is difficult, while it is easy, do what is great while it is small”.
Sun Tzu
“Do the difficult things while they are easy and do the great things while they are small. A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step”. Lao Tzu
An unborn child has all the potential to learn anything as this tender soul has no self imposed limit. And embrace everything the soul is exposed to while in the womb.
The greatest self survival skills such as these can be easily, spontaneously cultivated from after conception. The unborn is all ears and learn well by listening.
“The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn. ”
― Alvin Toffler (4 Oct 1928- 27 June 2016)
He who will not reason, is a bigot; he who cannot is a fool; and he who dares not is a slave. Sir William Drummond (26 Sept 1769-29 March 1828)
. Attachment is the great fabricator of illusions; reality can be attained only by someone who is detached. Simone Weil (3 February 1909 - 24 August 1943)
Listening and reading are both excellent way to acquire wisdom, knowledge and experiences of life from external sources. A classic example is the life story of Elon Musk. Who exhibited passion for learning early in life.
In his own words, “I was raised by books. Books, and then my parents.”
He reportedly read the entire Encyclopedia Britannica at age nine and would pore over science fiction novels, comics and nonfiction books for up to 10 hours a day. Some of the most influential books he read included “The Lord of the Rings,” “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” and Isaac Asimov’s “Foundation” series.
Unless, the cabinet of PMX, the government senior in position and authority see this vision of prenatal education, and start to take the first step to begin prenatal education from the womb even better before conception, there is little hope of a better future for this problematic nation. We shall perpetually plagued by crisis after crisis, blunder after blunder.
In China, in a duck farm someone placed a crocodile egg together with other duck eggs to be hatched. When the ducklings were growing up and alongside with the baby crocodile there was peace and harmony between these two classes of animals. From a few centimeter to a few meter, this baby crocodile live together eating the same food, sleeping in the same mud hole at night without eating any duck as its food. Such is the power and influence of behavior of a wild animal using prenatal exposure and nurturing its tendency to care for others in a natural environment.
If crocodile can be so trained this way, is it so impossible to do the same with higher intelligence creature like a human unborn baby?
It is wiser to educate and nurture a virtuous baby from birth, then to repair a damaged grown man.