THE Auditor General's Report is an annual story of loss and wastage in the public sector. Ditto 2022. And every year, there is palpable national disappointment and anger about how these public institutions are run and managed.
Putrajaya, the political capital of the country, expresses its perfunctory shock as the annual report makes its appearance. Yet, the rot returns with a vengeance to trouble the country for the umpteenth time.
This time, there was a slight variation in the "perfunctory shock" from the startled seat of the government.
Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim has issued a two-week notice to the Federal Land Development Authority (Felda) and the Armed Forces Fund Board (LTAT), two of the troubled federal agencies highlighted in the 2022 AG's Report.
Others similarly troubled also owe the nation an explanation of their annual distress. We are not talking about small money. Just five federal agencies reported a loss of RM3.115 billion.
If context is needed, even the recently raised service tax from six to eight per cent won't be enough to pay for this loss. Even if it could, why should the people continue to fund such humongous losses?
There is certainly something very rotten in the state of some federal agencies. It has to be a now or never re-engineering job to return the entities to their raison d'etre. Consider three federal agencies. Start with Felda.
Its establishment in 1956 had noble origins: eradication of poverty among its settlers, most of whom are Malays and Bumiputeras. Over the 68 years of its existence, Felda appears to have lost sight of its magnanimous raison d'etre.
Much of the blame must be placed on the shoulders of the federal agency's leadership and management team. When the loss of sight happened and who caused it is not for this Leader to determine. The answer would partially lie buried in the aged copies of the AG's reports.
The rest has to come from a thorough investigation going back as far as such a probe can. The LTAT, our second agency, has a lofty goal not unlike Felda: to safeguard the welfare of the armed forces personnel, mainly by managing their pensions.
It is only 52 years old, but appears to have developed the aches of the older agency. According to the AG's Report, the LTAT has been recording a negative balance in its reserves since 2020.
The fund, the report added, did not provide any impairment for its RM2.550 billion investment in Boustead Holdings Bhd and RM106 million in Pharmaniaga Bhd. Parliament's Public Accounts Committee is rightly getting involved in the erosion of the fund's reserves. The LTAT has responded by saying it has enough reserves to meet its obligations. A point missed, we must say.
Having enough doesn't answer the question of negative reserves for three years.
Finally, PR1MA Corp Malaysia (PR1MA), an agency that was set up to provide the poor with housing, now finds itself poor at housing. In 2022, it logged a net loss of RM257 million, pushing its liability to RM5.7 billion.
Square pegs in round holes? Investigate, we say. Ditto Felda, the LTAT and what have you. And then re-engineer before the pandemic of losses and wastage become endemic.
