Steven Sim Chee Keong
KUALA LUMPUR: Deputy Youth and Sports (KBS) Deputy Minister Steven Sim Chee Keong revealed that his ministry was the eighth worst in the corruption level among 25 ministries.
He said the position was a result of the report by the Public Service Corruption Ranking (PSCR) released by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) in 2016, which was not publicly disclosed.
He said the relaxation of the procurement and payment process with most of the contracts awarded without going through open tender processes had previously opened up spaces for fraudulent activities.
However, he said, what was surprising was that after the MACC arrested a KBS officer for misappropriation in 2016, KBS continued to carry out procurements without any open tender.
“Between 2016 and 2018, of the procurements totalling RM777.14 million, RM357.8 million (46 per cent) were implemented not through open tenders but via direct negotiations and limited tenders,” he told reporters at the Parliament lobby yesterday.
He added that the shortcomings taking place in the ministry led to the limited resources, due to lowest allocation in the federal government’s budget, could not be used maximally for the development of youth and sports in the country.
In this regard, Sim said a comprehensive reshuffle would be done immediately to address the shortcomings, as well as resuming the Corruption Risk Management (CRM) plan with the MACC which was terminated in 2017.
“We are still waiting for the MACC’s decision to station an officer to continue the CRM that has been terminated before,” he said.
Meanwhile, former KBS minister Khairy Jamaluddin said, the cases of the ministry’s officer who was detained for misappropriation, had contributed to the ranking issued by MACC.
However, Khairy conceded that there were some procurements which were made without open tenders, but were still in line with the rules set by the Ministry of Finance.
He said, for example, several procurements under the SEA Games last year were not conducted via open tenders, but through the Request Per Proposal process whereby the ministry invited several companies to give briefings.
“For example, the tender for the launch of the SEA Games, if we make open tender with only documents, we cannot evaluate the creativity, arts aspect, performance aspect and so on. So, we invite many companies to make proposals which were evaluated from the aspects of finance, creativity, experience and so on, “he said. — Bernama