The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of the Parliament was one of the items I've been wanting to blog about for a few months now.
The role of the PAC is to scrutinise and monitor the utilisation of funds approved by the parliament for the use by the State. This will include any public entities and organisations, public accounts and any items which the PAC decides as fit for investigation.
The committee comprise of 13 members, of which currently, 5 are from the opposition, roughly reflecting the composition of the Parliament.
I've been appointed to the Committee since sometime in May, and I must say, there has been frequent meetings called to discuss various issues ranging from the issue of subsidies, abuse of VISA-on-arrival, illegal immigrants, performance of Khazanah companies, the Middle-Ring Road II maintenance fiasco etc. Items coming up include the Maybank BII deal, the Department of Registration (JPN) of Sabah (over denial of citizenship issue), the Telekom Malaysia RM12 billion contract and more. Frankly speaking, there are probably more issues than we can practically meet on, thanks to our Government for creating these controversies.
Due to the sensitive nature of these investigations, the independence of the PAC must be protected at all cost. Hence when Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak said two days ago that "the cabinet had agreed that the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) scrutinise the acquisition of the Eurocopter EC725 helicopters to replace the ageing Nuri helicopters", I immediately issued a statement stating that such a statement makes a mockery of Malaysia's parliamentary system.
In addition, on behalf of the PAC, Najib said “the PAC would begin the process as soon as possible”.
As a member of the Parliament's PAC, while we welcome the Deputy Prime Minister's willingness to cooperate with the investigations, I find it a total mockery of the parliamentary process that any scrutiny by the PAC requires the “agreement” of the Cabinet. Worse, it appears as if Datuk Seri Najib had a major say in when the investigations can proceed.
The PAC made the decision to investigate the Eurocopter deal last Wednesday and it does not require the “approval” of the Deputy Prime Minister or his cabinet. The PAC is an independent institution of the Parliament set up to scrutinse the actions of the Government, including its cabinet and hence, any inference of subservience to the Cabinet is will be completely ludicrous and render the PAC incapacitated.
The Deputy Prime Minister and the Cabinet must respect the independence and integrity of the PAC. They must stop denigrating the Parliament and its institutions to tools of the Executive to achieve their own ends. In addition, they must cooperate fully with the PAC at all times, including if the Deputy Prime Minister himself, or members of his cabinet are called to be queried on various scandals which affects them or their Ministries.
6 comments:
didnt samy give a miss when called by sharir to give his side of the story?
doubt if PAC really has the teeth. In fact, PAC is being used as a tool to legitimise dubious deals. remember ECM Libra and Avenue Assets episode? it was as clear as daylight that the whole deal was a sham to benefit certain individuals! And PAC saw nothing wrong!
Hi,
With all said and blogged about. I want to know if there is any conclusions and actions taken to any of the investigations that were taken by the PAC. Is this no action and Talk only (NATO) and just give the oppsition ranting points? What most of us want to see is to see those resposible goes down for the three count.
YB Tony,
Some question:
i)if PAC find inconsistency with established protocol / SOP, what will PAC do?
ii) If a public servant refuse to answer PAC query, what can PAC do?
iii) Does PAC have the power to prosecute?
I hope PAC is not another toothless tiger.
Emily Pratt
Hopefully You will be able to hold your ground.
Over the years PAC is just a smokescreen. Is just another famous word in America "situation normal, all fuck up"
Would like to see whether the Eurocopter deal will be seriously look and investigated. The Maybank deal and the broad band that costs billions.
Actually there are many more that the public would like to bring up but over the years PAC -Participate Actively in Conspiracy, sudah malas sebab nothing will come out, no result ma...!!!
Hi YB
Mr. N has yet to reach the "top". Thus, he has yet to fully utilised all his "luck" in his life.
He will be still in power and your need to be careful on what you said.
Defence bribe arrests
New 6:15AM Thursday Oct 23, 2008
Two men have been arrested over allegations that Europe's largest defence contractor offered bribes to secure arms deals.
Britain's Serious Fraud Office said the suspects had been questioned as part of an inquiry into BAE Systems' dealings with countries including the Czech Republic and Hungary. BAE denies the allegations of bribery.
Britain's Financial Times reports that one of the arrested men is Alfons Mensdorff-Pouilly, a Viennese count who has worked as an adviser to BAE.
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