Editorial
Civil service reforms
Plug the holes in the draft
There is little question that the country's civil service has been declining performance-wise. A round table discussion on the Draft Civil Service Law has highlighted this truth once again. The round table has focused on those issues related to the civil service that have regularly been talked about without much follow-up action being taken. It is now time for a full, concentrated approach to the question of civil service reforms. One notes, though, that over the decades a good number of moves were made toward promoting administrative reforms. Unfortunately, though, nothing has come of all that enthusiasm.
Now that a draft law vis-à-vis the civil service is here, its provisions must be thoroughly deliberated upon in the public domain. There are clear loopholes in the draft law that need filling in. For instance, to what extent politicisation of the service will further mar its quality through an application of the president's quota is a huge question. As it is, the service has in the past four decades systematically been politicised. The draft law ought to plug such politicisation-related holes. The whole point here is that governance depends as much on the nature of political philosophy as on an efficient running of the administration. Unless civil service appointments are made on the basis of merit and competence --- and here we need a powerful, independent Public Service Commission to ensure that --- it will be naïve to suppose that good administration will underpin the workings of government. Besides, there are already some other limitations under which the civil service has been functioning. Politicisation is one, sure. There is too the matter of contractual appointments. In recent times, such appointments have generated controversy for various reasons. Moreover, a glaring weakness of the civil service has been the growing tendency toward making officers redundant as OSDs. A study of the large number of OSDs in the service at present points to the huge waste of talent and resources in the nation's administrative system. Does the draft law have any answer to these issues?
The essence of the civil service will be rendered pointless if civil servants charged with corruption cannot be prosecuted unless permission from the higher authorities is first obtained. The draft law must do away with such provisions, for they could well serve as a blank check for unbridled corruption in the service.
Let the draft law be discussed in Parliament and among broad civil society before being adopted.
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