Bureaucracy review plan underway

 

 

By Alexander Rheeney

AN AMBITIOUS plan to ‘corporatise’ the bureaucracy will go before the Government for its consideration.
Under the proposal public servants will be put on performance-based contracts and have measurable outputs.
 
Oro governor Gary Juffa, who is pushing for the changes, said the PNG public service was yet to be subject to an extensive review and its corporatisation would make it modern and relevant in a changing world.
“The purpose here is to make a concerted effort to corporatise the public service and make it modern and relevant. It has never undergone such scrutiny and has never modernised to meet current demands. It is still stuck in the colonial era while the rest of the world has moved on. If we are to develop PNG, we need an effective public service machinery to do that. The public service has been long an area where those who cannot work in the corporate sector have wallowed,” he said.
 
Decrying the brain drain from the Government to the private sectors, Mr Juffa said the trend will continue unless civil servants’ salaries and working conditions were improved.
“We cannot demand the best of the public servants when we do not give them the best. They live in villages and settlements and are on K7 a fortnight for housing and yet we expect them to turn up and be productive. This is not going to happen.
“The overhaul will see an improvement in wages and conditions, streamlining and right sizing and I would propose the abolishing of the cumbersome Public Service Management Act to be replaced by a more effective Manual that would best be a Contract Translation Manual of sorts,” he said.
 
It is understood the bipartisan committee will be chaired by Goroka MP Bire Kimisopa and comprise MPs Joseph Lelang, Philip Undialu, Mehhra Kipefa and West New Britain Governor Sasindran Muthuvel.