Most civil servants unproductive, unskilled

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

State Minister of Administrative Reforms Feisal Tamin has criticized the civil service, saying some 60 percent, or 3,000,000, of its five million staff are unproductive, unprofessional and corrupt.

"Around 60 percent of our civil servants are unproductive and have low standards of professionalism. Some go to office just to read a newspaper and many only see their offices once a year," Feisal said after swearing in new executives of the Civil Servants Corps office in Batam, Riau, on Friday.

Overstaffing in government offices across the country dates back to the New Order era but no concrete action has been taken to solve the problem due to the high unemployment rate. Unemployment has reached 48 million nationwide.

Feisal said all government offices, agencies and state-owned companies employing civil servants should be reorganized in a move to minimize overstaffing.

"We currently have five million civil servants, but only 40 percent of them have the skills and qualifications needed to do their tasks properly. With the proposed organizational revamp, a government office should no longer be over or short staffed," he said.

The minister, who is a former secretary-general of the home ministry and former chairman of the Indonesian Civil Servants Corps (Korpri), acknowledged that corruption and collusion was rampant in the civil service but said it was very difficult to minimize because of the absence of data and of reports on the practices.

"Qualitatively, the number of legal violations and corruption cases in the civil service is very high, and many have been punished according to civil service rulings and the law," he said.

Feisal has called on the public to report corrupt civil servants through P.O. Box 5000, saying his office would look into reports and complaints submitted through the post box.

"The public, including journalists, are encouraged to report corrupt government workers, complete with data to allow investigators to probe the cases professionally," he said.

He said the government would also issue a ruling barring government officers from occupying two jobs because it would make them unprofessional and unproductive and simultaneously decrease job opportunities for others.

Feisal said further that the government was also considering a return to the six-day working week for civil servants to provide optimum service to the public.

"The five-day working week, which was implemented almost 10 years ago, has been found to be ineffective, leading to inefficiency in the provision of government services," he said.