Stop hiring civil servants, just improve existing ones
Pahala Nainggolan, Jakarta
Recruitment of new civil servants (PNS) has always been a big event. People still clamor to get on board even though they know that the salary and benefits of civil servants are substandard.
With more than three million employees, the government is the biggest employer nationwide in terms of number of staff and job complexity. People love to work as civil servants since the opportunities to generate "extra income" are available. Many of them show that. Theoretically, their salaries are not enough to cover their daily expenses such as food, shelter, education and transportation, but in reality that is by no means the case.
The bureaucracy is supposed to work efficiently to support the administration, whose main duties are serving the public and making policies. In fact, however civil servants tend to be served rather than to serve. Dealing with them takes time, energy and money, regardless of the fact that we pay taxes for their salaries.
Efforts to reform the bureaucracy have not worked well, due to some chronic problems.
First, low pay is always blamed for rampant corruption in the bureaucracy. Corrupt practices involve not only one or two persons, but often the whole institution. They range from cutting work hours to abuse of power. Some fake business trips are made, kick-backs from vendors are sought to collect so-called tactical funds, which are then divided up.
A government office head must fight for projects, which mean new sources of income. There are few guilty feelings in doing so because it is aimed at improving everybody's welfare. And so, the public has simply become accustomed to sub-par public services. Before 1998, bribes greased or sped up public services. Now, however, bribes are the primary fuel for the machine; it is the only way to service.
Second, budget allocations for public services tend to increase. People care about how much money is spent on public services compared to how much is spent on paying civil servant expenses. It applies to both state and regional budgets. The facts show that most local administrations spent over 80 percent of the budget to finance their bureaucracy. In the future, raising the budget will be harder, while improving civil servants' welfare is a must.
Third, the size of a bureaucracy is a paradox. On one hand, the number of civil servants is considered too much, but on the other hand poor public services have been constantly blamed on the lack of personnel. In fact, we can see state employees just fooling around during work hours or moonlighting.
Administrative reform is always met with problems such as budget availability and the no lay-off tradition. Therefore, we need to consider many aspects simultaneously.
First, the government could avoid budgetary constraints in raising civil servants' salary levels by introducing a totally different remuneration policy. The existing uniform system causes civil servants who work in areas with high costs of living to feel poorer than their counterparts in small towns. The salary scale must be indexed based on areas of assignment. This means civil servants who work in big cities like Jakarta deserve higher pay.
A functional index is also worth introducing, in which salary levels are determined by functions. Civil servants whose jobs are vulnerable to corruption, such as tax auditors and policy makers, must be paid higher than the rest. This is expected to reduce the temptation to embezzle or demand bribes.
Second, improving civil servants' welfare is not limited to salary increases. If benefits are generous, a low salary is not a problem. Benefits should make them feel secure so there is no uncertainty about their family's future. Among the benefits are support for their children's education, housing, transportation and health, which are considered more valuable than salary increases.
They will not worry about the salary if they can send their kids up to universities for free, or if they or their family members get sick since adequate health services would be provided for them. Housing and transportation from home to office would also be greatly appreciated. Lower living expenses create more saving. The cost to provide these benefits is less than annual salary increases.
Improvement of welfare should also cover retirement periods. High-ranking officials are aware of a yawning gap between facilities and perks they receive while in office and what they get after retiring. Retirees only get up to 75 percent of their basic salary, plus minimum medical coverage. No other allowances are available after retirement, while daily expenses may go up if not the same. Following this logic, a high-ranking government employee will try to save as much as possible to avoid problems when he/she is retired.
Third, key indicators and targets for each government institution should be renewed and announced every year. The public will know and appraise the performance of civil servants in serving them. Those targets and indicators then are defined into more details up to individual job description. Currently, civil servants do not have individual job descriptions, making it difficult to assess their performance. A stick and carrot policy cannot work in the absence of the target and indicators.
By knowing institutional duties and targets, the public will be able to direct their complaints to the right place. Another impact is that every project would have to be designed directly to meet public needs, rather than wasting state funds and claiming to have served the public. Knowing the projects they handle, the public will assess the government employees based on the real benefits of the projects for them.
Taking those steps simultaneously will hopefully result in a better image of civil servants. At the end, we will see whether we need more civil servants or probably all that we need is to revitalize the bureaucracy. It means a major overhaul in government institutions should take place.
The writer is a former state auditor who is pursuing a doctorate degree in management science at the School of Economics, University of Indonesia. He can be reached at pahala@tifafoundation.org.
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