Lack of teeth to bite into graft, says ex-BN MP
Issues of leakages and possible graft continue to crop up yearly in the Auditor-General's Report because organisations meant to curb such problems have "no teeth", said a former BN MP.
Issues of leakages and possible graft continue to crop up yearly in the Auditor-General's Report because organisations meant to curb such problems have "no teeth", said a former BN MP.
Kamal Salih said this included the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) and the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC).
The Universiti Malaya (UM) adjunct professor, who was once a PAC member, said the committee's findings are not debated and there is "no follow-up".
"The PAC only meets government officers, and reviews issues raised by the Auditor-General. Then we go back to the government leaders.
"And if we ask the government department, they'd say they have taken action," he told reporters after speaking at a forum at UM last night.
He said that the MACC should be able to take its own action on matters highlighted by the Auditor-General but they are hard-pressed to do so without prosecutorial powers.
"Prosecution powers are with the Attorney General's Chambers, and that is another dysfunctional body because it is controlled by the executive," said the former Wangsa Maju MP, urging reform.
He added that government expenditure should be tracked more strictly "so we won't be surprised when we go over budget and have to ask for a supplementary budget".
He said another urgent reform is on consumption subsidies, which include reviewing contracts with independent power producers, who receive natural gas subsidies.
"The contract is lopsided. It is up for review soon, but the horse has left the barn.
“In the future, maybe the distortions will be addressed to shift subsidies from consumption based to equity-based," he added.
'Dr M passed deficit buck to Pak Lah'
Kamal had earlier addressed a full-house forum which followed the launch of Jomo Kwame Sundaram and Wee Chong Hui's book Malaysia@50.
Among others, the book discusses the different stages of Malaysia's existence, including the "three regimes of (third prime minister) Dr Mahathir (Mohamad)".
Disagreeing, Kamal said that the Mahathir era was only split into two parts - Mach 1: The Bersih, Cekap, Amanah era and Mach II: The money politics era.
The second era, he said, was spurred by the Umno battle between Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah and Musa Hitam, which "started money politics in Umno and started the rentier class".
"Mach II ended after the (1998 financial crisis), when the numbers were on the wall and (Mahathir) knew he could not resolve the deficit problem.
"So he passed it to Pak Lah (fourth premier Abdullah Ahmad Badawi) and the first thing Pak Lah tried to do to remove the deficit is to remove mega projects," he added.
Other speakers at the forum organised by the Faculty of Economics and Administration and Malaysian Social Science Association, were UM political economist Lee Hwok Aun and sociologist Abdul Rahman Embong.
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