COMMENT To have one’s electronic mail (email) addresses published on official websites is one thing, but to respond to email complaints is another.

A particular study conducted by an independent group on how promptly state assemblypersons were responding to emails, tweets and other social media, found that a number of these elected people’s representatives do not even bother to read their emails.

Worse, they do not respond to complaints. From my own experience, emails sent to the state assemblyperson of Paya Jeras, Mohd Khairuddin Othman, for example, highlighting the condition of the children’s playground in my housing area, were never responded to. Till today, the playground is still requiring some repair. Emails to the MP for Subang, R Sivarasa, also did not receive any response.

These are elected people’s representatives. What about government department heads and cabinet ministers, is there not even the courtesy of a response? Is it because of the huge number of emails received in a day that make it a daunting task for anyone to even bother to respond?

Emails to the president of the Selayang Municipal Council have always fallen on deaf ears, not to mention complaints that were highlighted not receiving the attention of his men on the ground.

Recently, I also wrote several electronic mails to follow up on behalf of some friends about their strata title for a few commercial blocks in Wangsa Permai and Casa Tropicana in Petaling Jaya, and despite re-sending emails to all the parties concerned several times, there is a wall of silence, except a response a couple of months ago saying that the owners of Casa Tropicana would be receiving their strata titles by end-February.

Emails to Multimedia and Communications Minister Ahmad Shabery Cheek, too, were never responded to, despite Ahmad Shabery being a “communications” minister.

Several years of following up on the expansion of a road into Sungai Palas Boh Tea Plantation has ended with a no-response from the Public Works Department (PWD) director-general, as well as its minister. The minister responded to my emails previously on one or two occasions, but lately, he, too, has dropped the habit of responding to emails.

An electronic mail response from the PWD a couple of years ago promised that RM6 million will be allocated during the fifth roll-out plan in January this year. Till today, as I understand it, there is still no news of the allocation for sections of road belonging to the state to be expanded. Boh has done its part for sections of the road that are built on its land.

Over the incident of a relative who swallowed a hundred pills or more, emails to the health minister, state Welfare Department (under the Women and Family Development Ministry) and Selangor state exco member for welfare, were not being responded to, despite the same email being re-sent on several occasions.

Leadership by example?

Talking about leadership by example, emails sent to najib@pmo.gov.my in the past, too, did not receive any response. The more times a complainant has to write to highlight a problem, and the more you drive him up the wall, it may end up like what happened with the anti-GST group at the Kelana Jaya Royal Customs and Excise Office.

Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak may not be bothered by complainants for now, but when complaints are not being attended to, it will cost him and his BN component parties votes in the coming general election.

At a time when Singaporeans are mourning the death of their statesman, I cannot help but recall the words of the late Lee Kuan Yew which had riled up Malaysian politicians, but are nonetheless true. The late Lee had described Malaysia as a “failed state” due to racial polarisation. Our politicians and government department heads have failed badly in their communications test.

Let me share this experience. About 10 years ago, I had a complaint against a rude immigration officer known as Mr Ng at the Singapore Immigration checkpoint at the Second Link. While returning from Singapore, I mistakenly walked into an auto check-in point, thinking that it would read my passport.

From a distance, Mr Ng shouted, “Do you think it is like your auto-gate system?” Offended, I told him that I did not know, and he could have at least been more polite. Of course, this old grumpy officer was unhappy and took my passport with him to check. After waiting for about 10 minutes, I asked if there was any problem with my passport.

When he told me, “No problem,” I asked for my passport back. This is when he started shouting loudly before returning me the passport. In one sentence, I promised him that I would bring the matter to his superiors.

Singapore is supposed to be highly efficient. I wrote electronic mails to the Singapore Immigration Department and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in both Malaysia and Singapore. At that juncture, Syed Hamid Albar was the Foreign Affairs Minister. Sure enough, NONE of the people responded to my emails. Having been advised by my Singaporean friend, I even emailed to the opposition leader of Singapore, and there was no response!

After nearly two weeks of emailing and faxing my complaints, the various departments and ministries were still giving a deaf ear to my complaint. Finally, I found Lee Hsien Loong’s ( left ) email address from the Internet. To the younger Lee’s credit, within 24 hours, there was finally a response from Lee’s personal assistant.

If the personal assistant of Lee Hsien Loong could respond to email complaints, I do not see why emails sent to the cabinet ministers or directors of departments cannot be responded to, unless you are telling me that our locally produced secretaries are incapable of responding either in English, or Bahasa Malaysia.

General courtesy

It is general courtesy to at least respond to emails sent to oneself. This is one thing I cannot understand, why bother to publish your email address, but never responding - or even assigning an officer - to respond to emails sent to you?

It takes time for the members of the public to write to you, therefore, it is frustrating for them not to receive a response. This is why Malaysians generally do not have much confidence in our government machinery. They know that their emails will eventually end up somewhere in the cyberspace.

Do Malaysian policymakers and public servants understand the meaning of courtesy? I can understand if a street sweeper does not respond to emails, but what about the prime minister of Malaysia? Does he not even have a good personal assistant that knows the importance of responding to electronic mails?

Let me tell you who in the civil and political circle are good at responding to emails: Dr Tam Heng Wah (former Public Complaints Bureau head), Elizabeth Wong (Bukit Lanjan state assemblyperson), Ambiga Sreenevasan (former Bersih 2.0 co-chair), the late Ani Arope (former TNB chairperson) and his personal assistant, Syed Hidzam Syed Osman, and opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim. There are, of course, others, whom I cannot list out.

STEPHEN NG is an ordinary citizen with an avid interest in following political developments in the country since 2008.