Advisory committees to advise advisers, to advise ministers - Rafidah Aziz

14 January 2022

It does appear that some Members of the political government, have quite inadvertently shown that they are unable to function.

One after another, beginning with the top person himself, an array of "advisers" continues to be appointed.

Ministry and Ministerial functions are being sliced up, like a cake, and slices given to the various "advisers".

I guess the ‘Keluarga Malaysia’, at the top there, require a member to look after each and every site in the ‘family home’ from the rooms to the outhouse.

One member cannot handle and manage!

The Ministers of my generation (and I was a cabinet minister for 28 years and not months!) had a limited number of personal staff.

One special private secretary, one secretary, one political secretary, one press liaison office and one security.

There is no advisers, special assistants, and special appointees

I do believe that we were able to serve the people and nation, with the full support and dedicated service, of the civil servants, and the staff of the various departments, agencies, and corporate bodies, under our watch.

They advised us, with their institutional memory, and long service experience. Ministers came and went. They are the permanent staff.

The nation was always on an upward development trajectory. Of course, we had crises along the way. Economic and financial, (including economic contagions), as well as social, there were also national tragedies and disasters.

The political government, supported by various sectors of the public services, including defence and military, police, and the many Malaysian embassies, as well as departments and agencies, based abroad managed to successfully overcome the problems, which arose from the various crises.

By the grace of the almighty, Malaysia bounced back, after each crisis. Why then, do the political government functionaries of today, need so many extra fingers on their hands?

It is already a terribly bloated political government. Must everybody have that retinue of staff and advisers, before they can function effectively? and must the public funds be diverted to all over the place, without due care?

How credible can any "performance evaluation" be when it is self-evaluation? and applying what seems to be a very low benchmark! as such it is nothing to shout about.

In fact, it is the rakyat who are the ones, who will eventually do the evaluation of the performance of the political government and the rakyat does set high benchmarks, as well as comprehensive criteria.

May the almighty save our Malaysia.

Tan Sri Rafidah Aziz

Former Federal Minister