Declare your assets or quit
We want to know that the people who are entrusted to take care of public services are clean and trustworthy.
If you are a public servant or minister, you should make a public declaration of your assets. A private disclosure to the prime minister is not enough.
Last week, we heard more news about suspected corruption involving government officials. A senior official in the Tourism Ministry is currently under investigation. He joins several others who were nabbed last month, including a Datuk Seri at DBKL. It was reported that one of these officials had stashed RM400,000 in the ceiling of his house. The bank accounts of these officials, involving around RM13 million, were frozen. Cars were impounded.
Which public servant can legitimately have several million ringgit in his bank account, drive expensive imported cars or be the owner of several high-end properties?
If officials are involved in graft, then investigations, up and down the line, should be made. We want to know that the people who are entrusted to take care of public services are clean and trustworthy. We don’t want crooks to take charge of our affairs.
Following the exposé involving the DBKL official, the Federal Territories’ Minister, Tengku Adnan Mansor, dismissed calls for a declaration of his assets. He claimed that as a former businessman, he had lots of assets and if he were to declare them, his children and wife might become the targets of kidnappers. He said, “All kinds of things can happen. Robbers could come after us.”
What about robbers targeting members of the general public? Isn’t it strange that Tengku Adnan cannot see this possibility and also the importance of disclosing his assets?
But he is more interested in protecting himself.
Last month, the police warned the public to beware of a white van which had been seen driving around certain areas. The police believe that people in the van wanted to abduct children. The alert issued by the police debunks the myth that only high profile and wealthy people like Tengku Adnan risk being kidnapped.
On March 22, the Chief Secretary to the Government said the National Audit Department and the Auditor-General would review the entire auditing process. Since then, we have not heard of any follow up to the promise.
The Chief Secretary’s call was made in response to a call by the Minister of Youth and Sports, Khairy Jamaluddin. This was after a senior official was implicated in a corruption scandal involving RM107 million.
Khairy also announced that he would initiate changes to the procurement process. What are the changes that he said he would make?
When is the Auditor-General going to investigate each ministry with a fine tooth comb? If annual audits are supposed to uncover underhand practices, then why did we not see any exposé for several years before this? The misappropriation of a few hundred million ringgit of taxpayers’ money does not happen overnight.
The spate of scandals being exposed makes the disclosure of personal assets even more pressing.
Mariam Mokhtar is an FMT columnist.
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