AUGUST 23 — They have 1.5 million votes, so let’s be careful with them.

What about this counter-view — to the oft-presented tedious argument about the number of civil servants in the electoral roll — there are 10 million more Malaysian voters, and they don’t get their salary from the national treasury, but they sure pay for the treasury.

Why not in #MalaysiaBaharu accept there are diabolical problems in the service and concede that potential solutions will upset a lot of people inside the service?

Two explanations before a continue.

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The civil service is the key deliverer of public good to the people. Be it teachers, policemen or road transport department clerks, but they can’t deliver without process, oversight and accountability. 

It can’t be assumed that the service is doing as much as it can because it exists — or be ever ready to form more units, departments, agencies, boards or subsidiaries to solve problems the present staff should already.

The Barisan Nasional (BN) government was most interested in the loyalty of civil servants at the ballot box rather than whether they delivered at their posts. In extension, BN expected family members of civil servants to vote for them.

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Rising up in the service therefore was about adequate window dressing and sucking up to the appropriate BN minister or napoleon from whichever Umno division.

Just look at the unravels about the ex-treasury secretary-general, Irwan Serigar Abdullah, in the “undue” influence category to prop up the old regime. Or the required attendance at ministry events to present solid support for events, therefore for the minister, therefore for the government of the day.

Second, there are good civil servants. In fact, a number of them are stellar.

They are often abused because the work gets passed to them, or worse the burden without power. A reform of the service allows a window to harness them; to restructure the service rather than choosing the least compromised of the former boot-lickers. Start looking for those side-lined under the previous government.

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The kid glove approach to government servants must end, if there is to be real revolutionary shifts in the country.

For there is a numerical disproportion. Malaysians would want more teachers and policemen. But they’d be at the same time, on average, desire better trained and coached teachers and policemen. 

They do want numbers in our defence services to cope with the presence of pirates, kidnappers and Chinese installations. They probably don’t want in this age of automation and information technology, thousands milling about looking busy in government offices when the days of multiple form verification, authentication, duplication and accumulation are over.

A leaner service is imperative though not to be realised overnight. But the constant announcements about departments, agencies and boards being shut down but with all the staff absorbed into other parts of the service are disconcerting.

A wide-ranging voluntary separation scheme is inevitable.

In the same vein, culls send the best jolt to employees, as cruel as they may be. Treasury has to ask itself if its job is to primarily please the employees or the voters.

Also, the ministries spend on frills. Somewhere during Mahathir Mohamad’s first reign it was tattooed into our collective mindset that governmental success is down to appearances. 

Cue, large buildings — with shoddy contractors, of course — and four-wheel drive vehicles. This obsession with pomp and grandeur is obscene.

A ministry’s worth is in its output as measured by the voters, not in its inventory.

Many have asked why Jakim (Islamic Development Department) is heavily funded when Islam is under state purview, not federal, and the same critique can be made of so many federal agencies, overlapping with other sister agencies and replicating the same work at state level.

There is the option to pass funds directly to the states and cities to get them to build their capacity, with adequate oversight and controls, rather than rely on federal agencies to hang around.

The final proposition thrills me most. To identify middle managers within the system, those without baggage, and use them to reform the system and drive a delivery culture. 

If our society has lagged over these years, so much of it is down to a cumbersome and passive civil service without imagination, flexibility and autonomy.  

This would necessitate rapid promotions for talent within a leaner system. In a seniority culture, there would be dissonance and objections. Pakatan Harapan ministers must ride the wave of initial discontent.

My former colleagues can’t call out all these elephants in the room, since there is the very valid worry, if politicians play hard ball with the civil service, it can grind to a halt and wait out ministers.

There is no expectation of immediate action, but the signals so far have been about appeasement and a fear to rock the boat. The electoral victory was a result of Malaysians disagreeing with the previous navigation for the vessel, and therefore attempts to just tinker and not change course is a disservice to the mandate.

Most certainly the present leaders’ political capital would shrink if they do the right thing rather than focus on public relations stunts.

The civil service's culture of excess, need for irrational control and constant indifference can only be countered by ejections, discipline, decentralisation and management restructure.  

All of these will be painful, and at best it is about managing them in stages. However, the tinker-man approach to the service will ultimately frustrate.

If they want courage, consider the other voters who are the majority.

* This is the personal opinion of the columnist.