| By Andi Abdussalam |
Jakarta, Aug 24 (ANTARA) - The government has decided to temporarily stop recruiting civil servants to streamline the bloated size of its 4.7 million employee corps as part of its efforts to improve its bureaucracy's efficiency, effectiveness and productivity. "The government wants to have a better control of the effectiveness of its personnel expenditure and increase the quality and productivity of civil servants in accordance with the criteria of bureaucratic reform," Finance Minister Agus Martowardojo said. In order to temporarily stop civil workers recruitment, three ministers on Wednesday signed a Joint Ministerial Decree (SKB) on the moratorium on civil servant recruitment at the Vice Presidential Office. The three ministers were Finance Minister Agus Martowardojo, Minister of State Administrative and Bureaucratic Reform EE Mangindaan and Home Affairs Minister Gamawan Fauzi. The moratorium will be effective September 2011 to December 31, 2012 but there would still be exceptions for selected areas or positions. The number of civil servants in Indonesia at present is recorded at 4.7 million, or about 1.98 percent of the country's population. In 2011 a total of 107 thousand civil servants would enter retirement age while in 2012 the number of retirees would increase to 114 thousand. According to Minister of State Administrative Reform EE Mangindaan, the moratorium would be implemented in a flexible way as recruitment could still be done in certain areas. Examples of types of positions for which exceptions could be made were teachers, lecturers, prison wardens and workers in public services. "It should not happen that a penitentiary has no warden. The number of teachers and lecturers who are retiring is high so that their positions should be refilled," Mangindaan said. Mangindaan said exceptions could also be made in regional governments which had personnel expenditure below 50 percent of the regional budget, yet this also should be carried out selectively. "In essence, the moratorium is part of our bureaucratic reform program aimed at reforming the state institutional or organizational structure," the minister said. Finance Minister Agus Martowardojo said the moratorium was expected to reduce the government's personnel expenditure burden. "We will continue to control and keep a watchful eye on personnel expenditure and focus on improving the quality of civil servants. If the required quality and the right corps size are achieved, the productivity of civil servants will automatically increase," Finance Minister Agus Martowardojo said. He said the decision would be made so that ministries and institutions, including regional governments, would conduct organizational resizing or restructuring so that it would be able to respond to efforts to control personnel expenditure which increased every year. Data at the Budgetary Directorate General of the Ministry of Finance showed that expenditure for public servants set in the 2011 state budget amounted to Rp180.8 trillion. The figures for civil servants expenditures in the state budget continued to increase from year to year. "We are still in the second year of the bureaucratic reforms program. We are convinced resizing will be carried out and the quality and productivity of each of civil servants will increase," Agus said. The minister expressed hope that the efforts would reduce the swelling of personnel expenditure in the regions which indirectly reduce capital expenditure. After all, the capital expenditure was needed to build based infrastructural means in the regions. For this, the minister will require regional budgets (APBD) to include a 20 percent capital expenditure, if regional governments are willing to increase the allocation of personnel expenditure. "We will recommend a 20 percent capital expenditure of the regional budget. If they could not provide 20 percent, we will recommend them not to raise their personnel expenditure," the minister said. It was also mentioned in the decree that all government institutions and agencies were required to submit strategic plans on civil personnel formation for the coming five years. The strategic plans should have been submitted before December 31, 2011. "If they don't file a strategic plan, they will not be given budget next year," Vice Presidential Spokesman Yopie Hidayat he said following the signing of the joint ministerial decree at the vice presidential office. Earlier, Chief Economic Minister Hatta Rajasa said the moratorium which would be imposed beginning in September 2011, would save on regional personnel expenditure. "With the moratorium, more personnel expenditure in the region could be reduced," Hatta said. He said that by imposing the moratorium the government could increase productivity and reduce the potential burden of civil servants. Hatta said moratorium had no aim to personnel budget in the 2012 because the budget had been decided. Yet the budget would be used to pay non regular employees or workers, particularly health and educational workers. "Teachers' pay alone has reached Rp100 trillion because it continues to increase. So admittedly the burden is heavy because teachers' salary continues to increase. Besides imposing a moratorium on recruitment, the government is also considering streamlining the number of civil servants by among others offering an early retirement. "The number of Indonesian civil servants is fairly high and may burden the government's budget to provide salaries, pensions and insurances," Minister Agus said. "This is not only about cost cutting but it is more about increasing the productivity of civil servants," the minister said. The ministry also offered a chance to public servants aged between 50 and 55 years to retire voluntarily. ***3*** |
Rabu, 24 Agustus 2011
GOVT TEMPORARILY STOPS RECRUITING CIVIL SERVANTS
Senin, 04 Juli 2011
NUMBER OF PUBLIC SERVANTS TO BE STREAMLINED?
| By Andi Abdussalam |
Jakarta, July 3 (ANTARA) - The finance ministry, in its effort to reduce the burden of the state budget, is considering streamlining the number of civil servants by among others offering an early retirement. "The number of Indonesian civil servants is fairly high and may burden the government's budget to provide salaries, pensions and insurances," Finance Minister Agus Martowardojo said. He said in 2012 the government must think of reducing the number of civil servants, which at present reaches 4.7 million, so that budget could be well allocated for capital expenditure. As regards, the ministry of finance is now proposing an early retirement program for civil servants with compensation in an effort to reduce the bloated size of the civil workers' corps. The proposal was also intended to improve the corps' productivity. "This is not only about cost cutting but it is more about increasing the productivity of civil servants. So, the idea is to employ fewer people for the same task," he said. The ministry also offered a chance to public servants to retire voluntarily. "I myself in the directorate general of state treasury want to propose an early retirement program on a voluntary basis for civil servants aged between 50 and 55 years because this is possible under the existing law," Director General of Treasury of the Finance Ministry Agus Suprijanto said meanwhile. He said that civil servants who wanted to voluntarily take the early retirement would receive compensation in the forms of a severance fee the amounts of which would be set later. According to Finance Minister Martowardojo, the idea is not aimed at forcing civil servants to immediately enter retirement because the government still has the right to extend their service if their services were still needed. "Of course, the option is in the hands of the government. If the employee concerned wishes to retire early but his/her services are still needed we will of course retain him/her. If we have no objections to his/her retiring early, we will support him/her in doing so," he said. Deputy finance minister Anny Ratnawati meanwhile said that the early retirement program offered by the government would be done based upon performance standards. If an employee did not show improvement in his/her performance after training the government then would offer him/her to take early retirement. Anny said the number of civil servants which is now recorded at 4.7 millions takes a lot of state budget which in fact could be used for infrastructure development. Data at the Budgetary Directorate General of the Ministry of Finance showed that expenditure for public servants set in the 2011 state budget amounted to Rp180.8 trillion. The figures for civil servants expenditures in the state budget continued to increase from year to year. In 2005, it was set at Rp54.3 trillion and increased in 2006 to Rp73.3 trillion, in 2007 to Rp90.4 trillion, in 2008 to Rp112.8 trillion, in 2009 to Rp127.7 trillion and in 2010 to Rp162.7 trillion. According to Minister Martowardojo, much of the routine budget allocations for regions have so far been decided to finance government spending such as salaries while the amount of capital expenditure was very limited and consequently, the financing of infrastructure development was left neglected. "Care must be taken as it (the higher number of civil servants) will be related not only to salaries but also old age allowances and pensions and these will all have an impact on such institutions as state insurance companies Taspen, Askes and Asabri that may have financial difficulties due to the higher number of civil servants," he said. Therefore, it is important for the government to reduce the number of the bloating size of the public servants. Yet, according to Home Affairs Minister Gamawan Fauzi, the discourse to reduce the number of public servants in 2012 still needed further studies. "I cannot yet say the number of civil servants now needs to be cut. It still needs further studies. The ministry of state apparatuses and bureaucratic reforms is still conducting a study about it," Gamawan Fauzi said. He said that the number of public servants at present was still in line with the ratio of the population number, namely about 2.4 percent. This means that 2.4 civil corps members serve 100 people. "We cannot say that this number is big, because in the ASEAN region there is a country whose civil servant ratio is higher than ours. The problem now is that whether the present number of civil servants is already in accordance with the need or not," the home affairs minister said. Apart from the need, the government also needs to consider the distribution of civil servants. He said some regions spent 70 percent of their regional budget for civil servants, yet there were many regions which only spent some 15 percent of their budget to pay the salaries of their civil servants. "In principle, we support the idea of the finance minister but (we have to wait) for the results of a study by the ministry of state apparatuses and bureaucratic reforms. The leading sector is in his hand," he said. |