Better pay for civil servants

Better pay for civil servants

The hope that living conditions will improve for civil
servants and military personnel appears to be justified now that
the government has approved a proposal by the House of
Representatives to revise the state budget for the 1999/2000
fiscal year by increasing the volume (of state revenues and
expenditures) by Rp 1.4 trillion, from Rp 218.203 trillion to Rp
219.603 trillion. Such a hope is justified because all of that
growth is designated to increase the salaries of civil servants
and military personnel.

Increasing salaries in these two fixed-income categories is
indeed an urgent matter, especially considering our intent to
establish clean governance as one of the main objectives of the
current reform movement. This is easier to achieve if decent
living standards can be assured for the government apparatus.

For the longer term, however, the government should be
thinking about establishing a lean, efficient and effective
bureaucracy. If this can be achieved, the government and
legislators would be freed from the task of having to find ways
of increasing the salaries of civil servants and military
personnel, who -- in the lower echelons in particular -- are at
present being paid minimal wages. Unless such a strategic plan
exists, it will not be easy for us to establish a body of
governance that is clean, authoritative and efficient.

-- Bisnis Indonesia, Jakarta