Doubtful Excellence by Auditor General

The paper on 25 Oct 2011 brought the news of the 'excellent" rating given to many government departments.

However there weakness and the A-G was rather "clever" to be able to identify the root cause of the problems. The quoted reasons as listed in the paper were: monitoring, training and supervision. I was nice to know that no ill intention or profiteering and malpractices were quoted.

I was waiting for any report on the scale of the Port Klang Free Trade zone, the failure of the aerospace project the Eagle aircraft and purchase of the locomotive from China.

Last week, I saw the story of Malacca Monorail, millions was spent for the stationary display of the monorail and the track. So project speaks louder of the capability of the people in charge.

Some of the quoted abnormalities:

a. RM5.66 million of unapproved purchased of horses by nation sport institute.

b. RM 56 million cost overrun for the prison complex in Kuching with 11 years delay.

c. Buying a generic equipments are double the market price.

There do seem to be any improvements over the years.

The Change in Practice of Audit Report

Malaysian Parliament is having another unusual change in the way things are being done.

It has been the practice that the audit report is tabled on the same day as the budget. It would give the MPs the points of reference in commenting and discussing the proposed budgets.

However, this year the report was delayed, when this article was published on sunday 23 oct 2011, the auditor-general has not been given the opportunity to table the report. It mentioned that it will be tabled tomorrow.

It is not known what was the reasons or excuses used by the government to the delay the report. This can be the possible reasons:

a. The Bernama was quoting Ambrin as saying that this will enable both of the report to have equal coverage.

b. May be time was need to "correct" the error found in the report. There may be thing need to be adjusted.

The opposition has been harping in the issues and called is as a delay of 'unusual' proportion.

malaysian rice

Malaysian is going is cycle for its rice. In the news in Oct 2011, there was a great concern on the supply from vietnam due to the flood. Malaysia is an importer of rice mainly from Thailand and as the price of Thai rice has increased, Vietnam had becomes the new source.

Currently Malaysia imports about 1 million tons, Half from Vietnam, Thailand 30% Pakistan 16% and other country 4%. The present stock pile is about 1 million tons. The stock should last us for 5 months.

This is a known fact that there is the shelf life for rice. The humid temperature will encourage the development of fungus that produces toxins harmful.

Malaysia should be able to produce his own rice. That was the comment made by one local businessmen. There is always the big gap between should be and would be. Having sufficient land alone is not the main criteria of success. There was time when almost everyone in the rural areas were planting rice, but that was more for own consumption. There is no effort to plan it in the commercial way like the methods we are planting rubber or oil palm.

Without the drive from the government, malaysian rice will not be able to support the needs of the people. Without increasing its price, the jobs of planting rice may not be an attractive propositions.

electoral rolls

There were 800,000 new voters registered last year.

A question was raised on the duration to register a voter. Let say it 20 minutes each, then the number of minutes required is:

Minutes to register 800,000 voters = 20 x 800,000

hours required = 16,000,000 /60

= 2666, 666 hours

with 10,000

each worker will work 266 hours

There are many unconfirmed report of automatic registration. This further raise the fear of phantom voters.

EC gives another excuse

The star newspaper reported on friday 14 oct 2011 that the election commission does not have the time to conduct the checking on the authenticity of the voters. The excuse given was that there are 40,000 name to check and it will take two years to do.

It look like the EC chairman has just wake up from his sleep. The issue of phantom voters are not new. The last election the EC chairman cancelled the use of the ink, I forgot what was the excuse used. There was a newspaper report that the ink can be erased using a normal kitchen solvent. That was another attempt to justify the excuse used.

The June roll has 12,268,906 and the latest has 15,975,278, an increase of 3,706,372.

Many of the citizen wish we have a unbiased EC, like other developed nation

EC needs to verify 40000 names 1 day ago ... SHAH ALAM: Some 40000 unverified names on the electoral roll will be published by the Election Commission to weed out phantom voters. thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2011/10/14/nation/...sec...