No moral authority to increase taxes and cut subsidies
All proposals for increase of taxes, for imposition of new taxes and for cutting of subsidies should be removed from the forthcoming budget and put on hold until action is taken on each and every case of misappropriation in the AG’s reports (not just the 2012 report, but earlier ones too), beginning with the biggest cases.
Ravinder Singh, MMO
Government’s majority in Parliament to pass the budget does not make the budget legitimate. What makes it legitimate is the moral authority behind it. The moral authority is acquired by strict management of people’s money. This the government has not been doing for decades as shown by the Auditor General (AG) reports since the time of Tan Sri Ahmad Nordin. To put it bluntly, a government that has not ensured that people’s hard-earned money is managed with the utmost integrity has no business to cry shortage of funds to carry out its work; it has no business to demand that people tighten their belts to finance, not rightful expenditure, but the activities of corrupted civil servants busy siphoning the funds put at their disposal.
Why must people have to pay more or higher taxes, directly or indirectly, when the manager of the people’s money, the government, allows a portion of that money to be stolen through dishonest practices by the manger’s officers entrusted to handle the funds allocated to them to carry out their duties?
No matter what excuses are cooked up, no matter what high-flown justifications are produced, the fact remains that when money is spent on sub-standard products, on inappropriate products, on unnecessary products, or prices paid that are marked up by hundreds or even thousands of percentage points, there is misappropriation.
From the history of the Auditor General’s reports over the past several decades, the nature of the misappropriations indicate that they are not due to the ignorance or stupidity of the persons in charge of purchasing goods and services for their departments and agencies, but for reasons that the government would rather sweep under the carpet.
To gain the moral authority to impose taxes and cut subsidies, the government must first make every civil servant who had a hand in each and every case of the misappropriations reported in the AG’s report, pay for their misdeeds. In answering a question posed to him about 2 years ago, Tan Sri Ambrin Buang replied: “Actually, penalties are already there for criminal cases such as for bribery or negligence/dereliction of duty in causing losses to the government or tarnishing the good image of the public service. To me it is a matter of conviction in taking action against the wrongdoers. Some heads of department/agencies are reluctant to take action out of sympathy or simply to protect the ‘good image’ of their organisation”.
If the heads of departments refuse to act for whatever reason (e.g. “tak sampai hati” to act, or to “jaga periuk nasi” of the wrongdoers), then the inference should be that the misappropriation was done with their tacit approval and they should be held responsible. In such cases the heads themselves should have their heads roll for protecting the corrupted and or inefficient.
All proposals for increase of taxes, for imposition of new taxes and for cutting of subsidies should be removed from the forthcoming budget and put on hold until action is taken on each and every case of misappropriation in the AG’s reports (not just the 2012 report, but earlier ones too), beginning with the biggest cases.
The money that could be saved by stopping the leakages could well be more than enough to cover the additional money that the budget proposes to raise from the people.
Why must Joe Public be squeezed when the corrupted civil servants are let off to enjoy their ill gotten gains? It is very, very difficult to believe that there is no corruption involved in all those cases of mismanagement or misappropriation reported by the AG. If there is truly no corruption, there definitely is negligence and dereliction of duty, which also call for stern action.
Isn’t it ironical that Joe Public is the one made to pay for the misdeeds of the errant civil servants through higher and newer taxes and cutting of subsidies while the recalcitrant civil servants are treated with sympathy so they do not lose their promotions, salary increments or even their jobs? Why?
JIKA HENDAK (mengambil tindakan) SERIBU DAYA, JIKA TIDAK SERIBU DALEH.
