Making public officials accountable

 LAST WEEK Cabinet gave its approval for the Government to set criteria for appointing boards of directors and other senior officers to state-owned enterprises, in what could well be the first attempt to introduce stronger accountability to the much maligned public sector. 

The lack of a clear-cut policy directives with regard to management of Public Enterprises, failure to delegate decision-making to senior management, absence of commercial consideration in business decisions, political interference in appointment of staff, failure to adopt practical guidelines for the selection and failure to adopt practical guidelines for appointment of management level officers have been identified as some of the key constraints in improving the performance of Public Enterprises. 

Therefore Cabinet has decided that it is a timely need to adopt a formal and transparent method in such appointments and granted approval to a proposal made by the Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, in his capacity as the Minister of National Policies and Economic Affairs. 

It has been proposed to adopt criteria on professional and management experience, maximum age limits, provisions for prevention of conflicts of interest, disqualifications, prepared by the committee appointed by the President in making recommendations for such appointments. 

On paper the proposal makes much sense as public institutions are notorious for not holding their management accountable for mismanagement, wastage and corruption. Top officials of public institutions that have been making losses for decades are excused on the grounds that they are politically shackled and do not have the capacity to make decisions independently. Moreover it is no secret that most are political appointments resulting in many offenders being given impunity and protected under a system that wastes public funds but provides control to politicians.

 The attempt to professionalise the upper rungs of the public sector is welcome but it also has to come with tougher good governance and efficiency parameters often used by the private sector. Key performance indicators have to be implemented at the highest levels and directors and chairmen of public institutions must be held responsible for their losses. Only under such a system would every layer of the estimated 1.3 million strong public sector actually see reform.

 A strong auditing and accountability system has to be in place where parliamentary bodies such as the Committee on Public Enterprises (COPE) and Committee on Public Accounts (COPA) are empowered to take these top officials to task. Despite much talk by the “Yahapalanaya” administration little has been done beyond taking statements of top public officials who have incurred billions of losses. Take for example SriLankan and Mihin Lanka which is nearly Rs.1 billion in debt though top officials have not been held responsible for their actions at any level.

Another point is that when political appointments take place they should do so only under specific and extreme circumstances that are clearly outlined and approved by the public service commission. In addition once the appointments are made politicians should refrained from protecting the appointees and allow them to be governed under a legal and transparent system. Without such sweeping changes significant economic development will remain a challenge.