PUTRAJAYA, MAY 21- Former Chief Justice Abdul Hamid Mohamad (photo) has questioned the capability of the Enforcement Agency Integrity Commission(EAIC) which received RM14 million in budget for two years but issued two warnings and took one disciplinary action between 2009 and 2012.
The EAIC handles complaints from the public related to the government’s enforcement officers and agencies’ misconduct.
Abdul Hamid said according to Section 4 of the EAIC Act 2009, it was stated, among others, that the commission was to receive complaints of misconduct from the public against enforcement officers or agencies.
The commission is then required to conduct investigation and hearings on such complaints.
However, from 347 complaints received, only 60 were directed for full investigation and out of these, only three were fully investigated, with one case referred to the disciplinary authority of the Royal Malaysian Police and two cases closed due to double jeopardy.
“Under the Act, the full investigation should be done by a task force. But unfortunately, the commission has not established any task force yet, and full investigations were done by the investigators,” he said when presenting his analysis at a forum organised in conjunction with the EAIC Convention, here.
The other presenters at the forum were former Chief Secretary to the Government Mohd Sidek Hassan and former Malaysian Human Rights Commission (Suhakam) vice-chairman Dr Khaw Lake Tee.
Out of the 347 cases, Abdul Hamid said 110 cases were rejected, nine were referred to the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC), four to the appropriate disciplinary authorities, 149 required further preliminary investigation and 60 were ordered for full investigation be carried out.
“The bottom line is, since its establishment until the end of 2012, only one disciplinary action and two warnings had been handed down. For a budget of RM14million for the two years, they were very costly indeed,” he remarked.
Integrity, an ‘ultimate’ characteristic
Meanwhile, Sidek in his paper said the culture of integrity should be a permanent characteristic and be inculcated in everyone in the country.
He said it was the ultimate characteristic that one should possess and that everyone should be involved in upholding integrity.
“As a country with Islam as its official religion and with an eastern culture that emphasizes noble values, we should not have a problem with integrity. It should be more of an issue in western countries, which are more liberal,” he said.
During the question-and-answer session, he was asked whether it was necessary to make integrity a subject in school. He replied in the negative.
“What we can do is to hold courses on integrity for the educators (teachers) and they can include this aspect in their subjects,” he said, adding that students already had enough textbooks to carry everyday.
BERNAMA
