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| Sunday, 20 February 2005 |
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Business |  |
| News Business Features Editorial
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Public service and economic growth by Lloyd F Yapa The public service is in the news again. The victims of the devastating tsunami of December 26 are protesting, claiming that officials are not distributing the assistance promised by the government efficiently. This is not a new phenomenon. Most of the funds, (which may include foreign assistance) voted by parliament are not spent by the public service. Worse still, the benefit of a significant portion of the funds spent does not reach the ultimate recipients due to many reasons. In the main, it could be attributed to absorption of resources as administrative expenses, which are considerable due to overstaffing. Other reasons include the failure of projects/ programs, which in turn can be traced back to the neglect of the essential initial act of checking the feasibility thereof before implementation or just plain inefficiency. Corruption, (remember the roofing sheets scandal?), which is spreading like a cancer in the absence of punitive action by the relevant agencies, also takes a heavy toll. There is thus 'many a slip between the cup and the lip'! Under expenditure on account of the inefficiency of the public service is then one of the main causal factors of slow economic growth in Sri Lanka. Inefficiency shown up It must, however, be admitted, that the entire government machinery would have been taken unawares, due to the fact no such disaster had ever taken place within living memory and there was no disaster preparedness. When it did take place wreaking unprecedented havoc, there was enormous pressure on the government and the bureaucracy both from the people of the country including the victims and the international community to come up with an estimate of the damage caused and the cost of the required redevelopment. Certainly the senior officials concerned would have burned the midnight oil in preparing this estimate. Despite the existence of a surfeit of government institutions, there was unfortunately no agency, which was ready and skilled enough to take responsibility for the planning of the relief and rehabilitation effort. This is probably, why the officials at the Presidential Secretariat had to step in and create a makeshift arrangement. In addition, unlike in India, where there is a tradition of planned development, the required information would not have been readily available in an analysed form. In any case, first hand accounts of the damage would have been required. Therefore the first impulse of the senior officials would have been to consult the local officials. However, some of these personnel themselves and their offices would have been swept away. In some parts of the North and the East there was not even a semblance of central and local government machinery. Even under the best of circumstances, information pertaining to local conditions and the people living in these areas are not easily extractable, not being methodically recorded on electronic media as in other countries, but are lying in numerous files, which are manually and laboriously 'maintained' by a multiplicity of different officials, mainly the village officials or the GNs. These officials are a harassed lot. They have to cow down to numerous bosses- political, central and provincial government worthies - in the course of their duties, in addition to being poorly paid and inadequately trained. So most of the reports submitted would not have been up to the mark. In addition, the claimants for assistance would have increased several fold after the reports were prepared as others, who were not affected at all would have 'crashed' the queues! These would have been the reasons for the some of the shortcomings in the relief and reconstruction measures prepared and implemented. Professional approach It is now nearing the two-month mark since the tsunami hit the country. The first priority is to hand over the planning of such tasks as these to a permanent agency, as it would be wise, this time around, to adopt a professional approach. The project has to be planned, implemented and evaluated by a group of professional planners including economists, as it is they, who will know how to set clear terms of reference, which are connected to the desired national growth objectives and strategies. Their own first responsibility would be to recheck the information received from the field, (if it has not been done already), for undertaking the reconstruction phase. Professionals such as sociologists, who understand the concerns of the people and others like urban planners, who could rectify the haphazard construction, which has taken place over the years, have to be employed for the purpose. The planning body concerned would then formulate the activities for realisation of objectives, allocate responsibilities, set apart funding, co-ordinate the implementation with the public and private sector bodies selected and undertake follow up. In this day and age of the ICT revolution, it is nothing but right; the follow up work is executed with an electronic database fully integrated with the offices in the field. Important decisions regarding implementation and any change of course may best be taken by a respected senior figure in the government, advised by a cross-section of all stakeholders. If there is a regular flow of information to the public regarding progress as well, such an arrangement could inspire the confidence of all concerned, calm the fears of the victims and quell unpleasant bickering among stakeholders. Overhaul of the public service Another priority task, the body of planners has carried out is to propose to the government, that the public service be subjected to an immediate reorganisation with a view to improving its efficiency. This is a task, which is long overdue, as most development programs have floundered causing enormous waste of resources and misery, especially to the poor, as shown up in vivid detail in the aftermath of the tsunami. This is a program, which would require the consensus of all political parties, as several contentious issues are involved in this exercise, such as breaking the nexus between the politicians and public officials by resorting to a change of the constitution, rationalisation of institutions as well as functions and resolution of the overstaffing problem -in order to increase the levels of remuneration. Highly perturbed The people of this country, however, are highly perturbed, the politicians cannot even agree on a fairly simple issue like the extent of the reservation to be left for coast conservation and wonder how such onerous and complex tasks as the reorganisation of the public service and national reconstruction be accomplished under such circumstances. They are bewildered, why one of the political parties talks big about working together with the other stakeholders on reconstruction, but resorts to high profile media debates on issues, which have to be settled quietly within the task forces set up or launches itself into 'lone ranger' fund raising forays, when funds had already been pledged. The more urgent thing to do is to stay home, and get to work without fanfare in consultation with each other. Indeed one thing is clear. There is only one way out and that is for the leaders of the two main parties to agree to work together to arrive at a consensus on the main issues with the stakeholders concerned and implement a reconstruction plan using the funds promised so generously by the international community. We may otherwise never get a chance to develop the nation again and
alleviate the suffering of the people. |
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