The Auditor General Report 2010 Dilemma

To Malaysian, this annual report is a must read documents as it portrays the integrity and accountability of the government. It was indeed a sad story as the same problems arose from the poor management of the taxpayer money. In dire and drastic measures, the Public Service Department (PSD) points out that the responsible officer shall be taken into account for the government losses and they may even be sacked.

The crux of the problem is that there are no auditor post to probe the financial management in each department / branch. Usually the typical audit measures in government only cater for the standard operation procedures (SOP) in order to achieve the ISO standard or the rolling plan's expenditure performance for the Key Performance Index (KPI). Rarely any scheduled financial audit being carried out except if other party complain or based on selected cases only.

The number of department / branch in the government was huge and it will be difficult for the Auditor Department to probe them all whether it is in federal or in state. Typical people, when they in power and unable to resist the temptation, will tend to jeopardize integrity and seek out opportunity albeit all issued circulars by government Treasury. It will be timely for the government to introduce an auditor post in each department / branch. Well, government may need to fork out more to create the post, but the long term savings will outweigh the additional cost and thus promising as the taxpayer wastage shall be greatly reduced. The entrusted auditor must be responsible and shall be given a special clause of authorization, hence to suppress any unwanted pressure from any party. The proven wrongdoers should be slapped with a surcharge or be disciplined.

It is hoped that next year report shall be positive and indicate a very well performance. The vision of 2020 will be difficult and stuck in a thorny road if the taxpayer money are not well managed. The economy development may not be bullish next year. Ordinary people such as me will be cautious and tighten their spending and a sheer waste of public funds will be the last thing ever.