Red tape, unpunished wrongs breed graft in local councils: survey
Excessive regulations, ineffective laws and the laxity in meting out punishment against corrupt officials have been identified as the major reasons why corruption 'flourishes' at the local government level, a survey revealed.
Topping the list of the most corrupt government agencies were the police, followed by the Road Transport Department, Land Office and the Municipal Council.
The survey clearly showed that corruption was highly prevalent in enforcement agencies and licence-issuing authorities, lending credence to the general view that excessive regulation is the main culprit.
Funded by the Netherlands Embassy, this first-of-its-kind survey is conducted jointly by the Malaysian Institute of Management and the Kuala Lumpur Society for Transparency and Integrity.
It is a pilot initiative to test the ground on whether the quality of service delivery lived up to official claims in client's charters, mission statements and government policies.
The findings were released yesterday at a Transparency International Malaysia public policy forum series entitled "Putting local council governance under the spotlight: Is local council governance up to the mark?"
"To-date, there has been no published documentation on the perceived levels of corruption in government agencies and the levels of public awareness and concern about corruption in public life," read the report.
Stiffer penalty
With the Selayang Municipal Council as its focus, the survey interviewed consumers of the council's services, shop owners, hawkers and households in Selangor's Selayang Baru and Bandar Baru Selayang, which have a total population of 164,000.
Respondents numbered 979, comprising 582 Malays, 261 Chinese, 125 Indians and 11 others (Bangladeshis and Indonesians) in the 30-39 age group, with males outnumbering females 684 to 295.
"All the ethnic groups suggest stiffer penalty for officials caught for corrupt practices. The respondents also strongly cited simplifying regulation as a way to get rid of corruption," said the report.
The survey found that Chinese Malaysians were more likely to name the police, road transport and the fire services departments as being corrupt while Malay Malaysians named the elected representatives, the land office and the municipal council.
Indian Malaysians did not specify any department.
Serious level
The respondents suggested that the authorities look into ways of acting expeditiously on complaints, simplifying regulations and meting out appropriate punishment to discourage corrupt practices.
The higher-income and the female groups also blamed public indifference towards corruption as a cause of it. Further, they felt that complaints on corrupt practices were not taken seriously and the authorities had not acted upon them promptly.
The Selayang Municipal Council area was chosen for the survey because its mixed population provided a good sample of groups of various incomes, as well as different ethnic, professional and business backgrounds. The area was also home to a good variety of industries and a substantial number of government agencies providing services to the public.
Although a substantial 60 percent 'marked' the level of corruption as 4.7 on a scale of 1-7 (1 being not serious and 7 being very serious), only 5.3 percent thought it was at a critical 7.
Higher-income and business persons were also more likely to perceive corruption as a serious concern.
"Among the Malay and Chinese respondents, about 62-64 percent of those who run their own businesses viewed corruption as a serious problem as compared with about 54-56 percent of those who do not own a business.
"However, the reverse is true among Indian respondents where 46 percent of business owners viewed corruption to be a serious problem compared with 64 percent of those who did not own a business."
'Worrying trend'
About 30 percent reported an increase in corruption in the last five years; 21 percent thought there was a decrease whereas the rest felt it had remained the same or were uncertain. It also showed that Chinese Malaysians, Bangladeshis and Indonesians were much more likely to bribe in order to obtain licences than the Malay Malaysians.
In short, higher-income businessmen felt more compelled to bribe in return for a licence compared with other categories of respondents.
"Half the respondents, comprising Chinese and higher-income ones, felt that bribery would be helpful in getting faster approval for permits, licences, processing of complaints or other matters.
"The worrying trend is that 17.2 percent thought it was okay to bribe, and the proportion which condoned bribery is significantly higher among the non-Malays," according to the survey.
Shopkeepers and hawkers were much more likely to condone corruption as compared with users of local councils and householders.
The survey reveals that it appears that business people would bribe the officials with the hope that they would be able to operate their businesses more 'smoothly'.
Male respondents were also more likely to condone bribery.
Business bribes
The survey showed that overall, 14.5 percent of respondents had offered bribes to government officials. One-quarter of them paid between RM100 and RM300 while 17 percent paid more than RM1,000.
"Chinese respondents were more than three times as likely as their Malay counterparts to have offered bribes.
"About one-third of the respondents, mostly Chinese, have been approached to pay bribes because many of them are involved in businesses. About half of those who have been asked complied," the survey found.
On reporting of corrupt practices, slightly less than 50 percent of respondents felt it was difficult to lodge a complaint, though the business persons felt otherwise. Still, one can presume that following up on complaints is an additional effort that would put people off from lodging them in the first place.
Copies of the survey have been given to the Selayang Municipal Council, the Housing and Local Government Ministry and the Cabinet.
For more news and views that matter, subscribe and support independent media for only RM0.36 sen a day:
Subscribe now