PETALING JAYA: Political expediency rather than business acumen seems to have determined appointments to state-owned companies, and experts say this is a dangerous road to take.
They pointed out that when appointments are made as reward for political support or for continued backing, these companies will be filled with people who lack the knowledge essential to ensure business success.
National Council of Professors senior fellow Dr Jeniri Amir said such practice also shows a lack of good governance.
“We need people who are qualified to do the job at these companies, not those who are there simply because of the support they can give (to those in power),” he told theSun.
In a recently-concluded study, the Institute for Democracy and Economic Affairs (Ideas) noted that there had been several hundred such appointments over the years.
Research executive Nur Zulaikha Azmi said many of these appointments had corresponded with changes of government.
She said there had been substantial numbers of political and professional figures assuming or exiting roles in government-linked companies and statutory bodies since 2018.
She added that this prompted Ideas to track political appointments to state-owned companies, and the data can be viewed on its Pantau Kuasa website, that was launched on Sept 28.
According to the data, 270 such appointments were made during Datuk Seri Najib Abdul Razak’s 10 years in office. During the 20 months Pakatan Harapan was in Putrajaya, there were 72 such appointments, and from March last year to August this year, there were 139 such appointments when Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin was prime minister.
Jeniri pointed out that the appointment of unqualified people to lead statutory bodies and government-linked businesses will result in a negative impact.
“Such companies may end up losing money, thus creating a new burden for the government as this will have an indirect impact on the people.”
He said during Muhyiddin’s term, such appointments were made to ensure that his government continued to have a strong majority, adding that this was a way for politicians to be paid by the companies and to receive all the perks (as directors) at the same time.
Jeniri said Najib made a huge number of such appointments as reward for the support he received.
“For Najib, it was simply a case of ‘you scratch my back and I will scratch yours’.”
He added that such positions were created to help level the economic playing field for bumiputra, but the practice has been abused.
Universiti Tun Abdul Razak economist Dr Barjoyai Bardai said appointments to state-owned companies have mostly been made as reward for favours rather than based on merit.
“We end up putting unqualified people in charge and in the long term, this will have a negative impact on the country.”
He said for such appointees, their salaries and perks would be a greater priority than the interests of the company, adding that this would only add to the government’s operating expenditure, at the expense of the people.
Barjoyai urged the people to apply pressure on the government to put a stop to such appointments, given that it is also “immoral” to accept such positions.
Rather than spend on such appointments, he said the government should use the money to create an endowment fund to protect the assets of state-owned companies, government-linked companies and statutory bodies.
He pointed out that collectively, Malaysian state-owned companies now have about RM1.9 trillion in assets.
“This is even more than our gross domestic product.”
He said such a fund should have been set up in the 1970s when oil was discovered.
“It’s still not too late. We can inject (national oil corporation) Petronas, whose assets are now worth US$145 billion (RM602.26 billion), into the fund.”
