By Rajiva Wijesinha
Interestingly enough, it is only a couple of Provincial Ministries, obviously the North given its professional commitment to education, but also the Central Province, which have shown an interest in an initiative that will rapidly solve the problem of teacher shortages in areas essential for a proper education, if we are to work on the shortcomings the ILO report notes. And I should also note that the YMBA is trying to develop a programme to use our trainees to try in a few places to plug one of the most appalling gaps in our system. I refer here to the interruption to education at one of the best stages in life to learn, the nearly half year after the Ordinary Level Examination. I should note that I cannot understand why people are not indignant about this, a preposterous arrangement that I do not think obtains in any other country in the world.
There is certainly need of quick action, based on coherent plans, if we are not to slide further backward. The Asian Development Bank was scathing about the apology for reforms that the Prime Minister’s office had put together (without any consultation of experts in the field or statutory bodies such as the National Education Commission). But, far from responding to the suggestions they made, the Pied Piper continues on his merry way, when he can spare time from attending to everything else that, emulating Basil Rajapaksa, he has taken under his wing.
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Education is an area where the need for reform is obvious. We know that delay, in expanding opportunities, in revising curricula to ensure competencies required for employment today, in developing thinking skills rather than rote learning, will compound the current disastrous situation. Reform, we have shown, is easy if there is concerted effort and careful monitoring. That there is little hope of change in the current situation is yet another symptom of what seems a protracted Nonagatha period.
The final area I wish to consider is however less familiar and I think that it was this President who first introduced the idea in a manifesto. In the section on ‘An Advanced and Responsible Public sector’, he pledged that ‘The Divisional Secretariat will be made the chief unit that performs the priority tasks of the area. It will coordinate all activities such as skills development and supply of resources pertaining to the development of the economic, social, industrial and cultural sectors of the area.’
This made a lot of sense in a context in which our Public Administration has simply not kept pace with social and economic changes. No study has been done for ages about the different requirements of the citizenry now as compared with fifty years ago or a hundred. That is why for instance Local Government legislation still talks in terms of a few limited activities to be performed by local authorities, whereas many of them – water for instance – have been almost completely centralized, while there are many more services where local responsibility would be more effective.
A century ago, at the time my grandfather became the first Ceylonese Government Agent, it made sense that the Province should be the principal interface between government and the people. Within half a century authority had passed to the District, and much had to be done by the Government Agent in charge of each District. True, the development of Local Government had led to a bifurcation of authority, but in general the two agencies responsible, the elected and the appointed, worked together in cohesion. And the other political authority, the MP, could also be readily consulted, given that in general there was just one such representative of the people for any catchment area.
The preposterous electoral system imposed on the country in the eighties changed all that, with the emergence of many individuals dressed in brief but geographically extensive authority. And then, when Pradeshiya Sabhas were given distinct responsibilities, no mechanism was developed to ensure coordination with the Divisional Secretary who shared authority for the same area. Indeed, Pradeshiya Sabhas were sometimes carved out for political reasons – this has been a common occurrence in the Eastern Province – which makes coordination even more difficult.
Some years back, when I was agitating for the appointment of Grama Niladharis, with regard to whom there were many long standing vacancies, the Minister in charge asked why I was so interested in Grama Niladharis. I said that that was because that was the first interface between government and people, so it was necessary that the people should have a representative of government whom they could go to with their problems. But I also noted at the time that the Divisional Secretariat was the first point of contact at which decisions could be made, which is why it was essential to consolidate its authority and ensure better coordination with regard to the different services government provided to the people.
Given population expansion, the District can no longer go into details with regard to problems, and provide solutions based on knowledge based planning. That is why it is desirable that the Division be given greater authority to take decisions, but on the basis of consultation of concerned agencies. As it is, several Ministries have officials based in each Division, but there is no provision for consultation, no provision for dividing up responsibilities geographically while ensuring that the attention of subject specialists is drawn to areas of concern.
I should add in this context that bestowing more decision making powers on smaller units, with clear provision for consultation, will also go far towards solving some of the problems that have given rise to demands for greater devolution. Unfortunately the devolution question continues to be looked at in terms of repositories of political power, whereas the question that should be addressed is that of political responsibility, with stress on the need to enhance administrative convenience.
When I mooted the question, during negotiations with the TNA, of more power to smaller units, what I might term the most extreme member of their team objected saying that could be no substitute for more devolution. But Mr Sambandhan noted that his party could not reject what Gandhi had proposed, and was willing to take the discussion further. That was another example of those I term the spoilers in the Rajapaksa entourage preventing progress, in part I think because they feared unpopularity with those who exercised influence with the President.
That however is a question that needs to be addressed in greater detail. I hope that will be done, though this is not the place to go into it. Here let me simply refer to my continuing efforts to take forward the pledge made by the President. Thus, recently, with the support of the ILO, we have tried, at the Ministry of Vocational Training, to improve coordination at Divisional secretariat level, so that those looking for employment get appropriate training, those who have been employed can obtain useful qualifications, those who are trained can find assistance to develop as entrepreneurs. But it would be much easier if government issued instructions on the lines the President promised.
UNDP had already prepared guidelines for such coordination, and it would be a simple matter to enforce these. But in a context in which public administration has been carved up so ruthlessly – with Ministries of Public Administration, of Home Affairs and also of Provincial Councils – there is little chance of the rationalization the President promised, the combining of subjects that require coordination.
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I fear then that the March of Folly will continue. Our politicians will continue to lead us down the road to disaster. But in looking at the reasons for this, I am not sure that the organizer of this lecture was right in drawing my attention to the fact that Dr Anthonis ‘often lamented the lack of a strong leadership in our Political Hierarchy’. Though now we are floundering, we have to recognize that our first and second and fifth Presidents were all strong leaders, but they have not left much to show for their pains, or indeed their undoubted abilities.
But that is perhaps too strong a verdict. Our first President, and the fifth, both achieved much in their first terms in office. J R Jayewardene did transform the economy and, though he gave too much leeway to crony capitalism rather than a genuine market economy, he released energies that earlier statist socialism had stifled. And no one should ignore Mahinda Rajapaksa’s tremendous achievement in ridding this country of the terrorism that had held us in thrall for so long. And he also, we should note, engaged in effective infrastructural development that outstrips even what Jayewardene achieved in his first term in office, through the Accelerated Mahaweli programme as well as the housing projects implemented with such coherent planning by Prime Minister Premadasa.
But both collapsed in their second terms, largely because they took to playing to a gallery of their own making. Jayewardene, having perverted democracy to ensure he won a second term easily, panicked when he realized that he was not so very popular, and ruthlessly suppressed democracy while trying to shore up his popularity through racism. Mahinda Rajapaksa, a much more popular figure, simply gave up trying to take things forward on the basis of consensus, and retreated to a comfort zone that, while it did include able technocrats, avoided the consultation of the wider populace that can alone ensure equitable development.
President Premadasa was different, and did much even though he came into office in difficult circumstances. And he suffered even more from the fact that the Colombo consensus blamed him for all the abuses Jayewardene had perpetrated such as the murder of Wijeyadasa Liyanaarachchi, the Batalanda torture camp, the torture and killing of students in Ratnapura (all of which, Colombo conveniently forgot, had been perpetrated under Jayewardene). But he did his best and the country saw much development during his tenure, and in particular rural development, as well as productive educational initiatives. Unfortunately all his work was rapidly undone by his successor, whom he had handpicked it seemed for sheer incompetence. Such insecurity, which sadly President Rajapaksa also evinced, contributed to resentments that prevented him functioning at full throttle – and to electoral defeat in the latter case.
Strong leadership alone then is not enough, though I can understand people hankering after it in the present context. What is needed rather is self-confidence that will facilitate consultation, without fears of being challenged.
But I would also suggest another measure that will I think help immeasurably. That is limiting the term of office of the President to just six years, so that he or she can work without worrying about the prospects of re-election. And in one term, he or she will not be able to build up what I would call a straw successor, in the form of a family member, but would rather have to find someone able. And of course we need to change our mindset, so that we treat those who give up office with respect, and ensure that they are not insulted. Otherwise, as we now see is the case, no one retires, no one gives up office, not only because they want to continue in power but because they think they will be denigrated or at best forgotten when they give up.
Anyone going through the current Cabinet can pick at least a dozen individuals who should retire. But they will cling on for ever, even those with rapidly developing Alzheimer’s, because they have nowhere to go. The idea that, once your shelf life is over, you should go away gracefully is not common in Sri Lanka, but it seems to me that that will help us get over the major problem of incompetence that dogs the executive branch.
Dr Anthonis, it will be remembered, worked intensively when in government service, then worked intensively through private practice while also serving the state – most obviously as Colombo University Chancellor – and the people through his numerous social service activities. He was supported in this by Japan, a country with which he had excellent relations and which has done much for us, but which is sadly often left out of decision making processes because it does not blow its own trumpet.
I saw an obvious example of this back in 2007, when they were the only one of the Co-Chairs of the Peace Process not invited to meetings of the Consultative Committee on Humanitarian Assistance. The Norwegians and the Americans and the EU all came, but what they gave us in aid was only a shadow of what the Japanese were providing. I managed to change that, and the Japanese representatives at the time were absurdly grateful, whereas the gratitude should have been all ours given the manner in which they supported development without giving in to LTTE threats as the others seemed to do.
I was pleased then to find this commemoration taking place in the Sasakawa Hall, a monument to soft-spoken support without the grandstanding in which other representatives of the supposedly liberal backers of the current Sri Lankan government have engaged. The Japanese government too realizes how to care and not to care, and that I suspect is why Dr Anthonis found that country so congenial.
In his tribute to Dr Anthonis, Carlo Fonseka wrote ‘I figured out that during his 70 years as a doctor, he must have performed at least a hundred thousand surgical operations. The records show that no less than 38,000 of these have been done after his retirement from government service in 1971. With exemplary zeal and unrelenting dedication he has been performing for 70 years, what I consider to be the proper duty of a doctor, which is nothing more and nothing less than patient care and caring for patients.’
Teach us to care and not to care.
But also
Teach us to sit still.
Appendix
Report of the Committee appointed by the National Human Resources Development Council to explore new ways of working in the Public Sector
The committee met on four occasions, and had the benefit of written inputs from the following former Secretaries and Public Servants,, as well as from the Secretary to the Labour Ministry
Mr Dharmasiri Pieris
Mr H M G S Palihakkara
Mr Mahinda Madhihahewa
Mrs Malini Pieris
Mr Asoka Gunawardena (former member of the Finance Commission)
Mr Pieris also kindly made an oral presentation to the Committee.
The report consolidates the main observations and the deliberations of the committee. The main recommendations are
- a) Secretaries to Ministries should be appointed on a Permanent basis, by the Public Service Commission, and may only be removed by the Commission for reasons adduced
- b) The Constitution should be amended to lay down a specific number of Ministries, and departments of government should be attached to these Ministries through a schedule, without being shifted about between ministries. A list of proposed Ministries is attached.
- c) ‘The unsustainable and highly politicized practice of treating the public sector institutions…as a means to solve unemployment problems through ‘sponsored employment’ should cease forthwith.’ Quote from one distinguished Secretary, reinforced by another – ‘Don’t treat the public sector as a refuge for unemployed graduates’.
- d) Appointments to boards etc should be on the basis of specified criteria, and should not be changed with a change of Minister.
- e) Regular consultative meetings should be held (already specified but not coherently observed) and minuted with clear action points and responsibilities
- f) Clear performance targets should be set and measured with provision for incentives
- g) Training should be better focused and should develop communication skills, in particular reading and writing and presentation capacity in English
- h) While accountability should be stressed and public servants protected from political pressures, they should not be subject to nitpicking harassment that limits flexibility and effectiveness.
Independence and Continuity
- Secretaries to Ministries should be appointed, and therefore transferred, or removed if necessary, by the Constitutional Council (or if this is delegated to the Public Service Commission, the importance of the position should be noted and clear guidelines formulated, including screening procedures).
- This will not make them necessarily permanent, but it will free them from political pressures and arbitrary changes. The Public Service Commission should have Rules of Procedure which will strengthen its independence when confronted with what it sees as unreasonable requests.
- Systematic handover procedures are essential. A Code of Ethics for Secretaries with specific guidelines on handing over (with predefined formats and timeline for such handing over) is desirable. It would also help if Ministries had succession plans, with briefing sessions whereby senior staff and potential successors were aware of policies and plans for implementation. There are provisions at present, but they need to be enforced, with stipulations as to maintenance of records.
- While policies would be the prerogative of Ministers, administration should be the responsibility of the public servants, with regular progress reviews (not only of financial progress but also achievements against targets) so that adjustments can be made as required. Ministers, in formulating policies, should engage in appropriate consultation and should avoid sudden decisions that may not be in accord with existing policies and practices. This does not detract from their right to make changes, but this should be through full awareness of the existing situation.
To be continued on next week
