MACC: Address failings in the system

The Star

BY LOH FOON FONG
foonfong@thestar.com.my

PETALING JAYA: The Chief Secretary to the Government has been urged to form a special committee to act on the disgraceful findings of the Auditor-General’s Report 2012.

“Immediate action must be taken to address the weaknesses in the system,” said the Consultation and Prev­ention of Corruption Panel of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission.

It also called on the Chief Secretary to table proposals on improvements that would prevent such failings from recurring.

State governments and government-linked companies (GLCs) must take immediate remedial action as well, said the panel.

“We also support the proposal for a more frequent A-G’s Report, such as thrice annually, because this will enable more effective monitoring and supervision, as well as faster remedial action,” said panel chairman Datuk Johan Jaaffar.

The panel was disappointed with the discrepancies in the tender systems, supply and procurement systems and Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) of the ministries, agencies, state governments and GLCs concerned.

“We take a serious view of these weaknesses that not only could lead to abuse of power and corruption but undermine the government delivery system,” Johan said.

He added that the panel viewed with deep concern the serious acts of negligence in the system of control and supervision, which had even resulted in dangerous assets such as firearms going missing from storage.

“What’s obvious is that there is a lack of supervision on suppliers and contractors that (in turn) resulted in shoddy work,” he said.

Johan said the panel was also baffled by the fact that despite these weaknesses being highlighted in previous reports by the A-G, they kept on being repeated.

He said that while the panel took cognisance of the remedial mea­sures taken by the various ministries, agencies and state governments in response to the criticism contained in the previous A-G’s Report, stronger actions were necessary.

The panel commended Auditor-General Tan Sri Ambrin Buang’s commitment for exposing these weaknesses and the willingness of the Government to be transparent.

“The Government, in accepting the report, is praiseworthy and shows that it has no intention of keeping any part of it out of the public domain, no matter how critical the findings or how much these would result in negative perception,” Johan said.