KUALA LUMPUR: A civil service too large in terms of the number of employees will increase the government operating expenditure and reduce the financial allocations for development, Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad said today.
The Prime Minister said if there is no control over the size of the existing 1.7 million-staff civil service, the operating expenditure will take up a huge portion of the country’s annual budget.
“This will slow down economic growth due to the government’s inability to spend on development projects to generate multiplier effects on the country’s economic and social growth,” he said during the Ministers’ Question Time in the Dewan Rakyat.
He was replying to a question from Datuk Seri Ismail Mohamed Said (BN-Kuala Krau) who had wanted to know the rationale for the proposal to reduce the number of civil servants.
Dr Mahathir said the government felt that the number of civil servants can be reduced without jeopardising the performance of service delivery, the source of income of the officers involved and employment opportunities. — Bernama
