The Ministry of National Development (MND) has suspended the National Parks Board (NParks) officer in charge of procuring 26 units S$2,200 Brompton foldable bicycles in a shady deal that should have warranted the attention of the CPIB or CAD. The fact that National Development Minister Khaw Boon Wan earnestly defended the purchase of the pricey designer bikes as "valid" to enhance work productivity implicates him as accessory to "behaviour that can erode the trust Singaporeans have in the public service". Worse, MP Lee Bee Wah pointed out that the MND investigation was focused on the procurement process and not over the cost of the bicycles. That explains the Herman Miller chairs.
The NParks officer fingered for the transaction was not mentioned in the statement issued by by MND last night. Alternate media has narrowed it down to two possibilities, NParks Assistant Director (Bernard Lim) or Procurement Manager (Wesley Su). Since neither are under aged females, gag order should not apply. Strangely, Straits Times (but not TODAY) reported this morning Lim was named. Perhaps no willing scapegoat was prepared to take the fall, emulating the successful stratagem of the plastic surgeon. And guilty parties get to continue as "stewards of public resources". Khaw got himself out of the line of fire by initiating the MND Internal audit after the dirty laundry was aired on the internet, specifically the damning evidence about:
- Timing and duration of tender notice;
- Contrived tender specification;
- Award to neither authorised distributor or network of dealers.
MND, for opaque reasons best known to themselves, deem these discrepancies as inconclusive, and merely "suggested the possibility of bias". Bias is just another word for cronyism, defined as partiality to long-standing friends. Wikipedia states that "democratic governments are encouraged to practice administrative transparency in accounting and contracting, however, there often is no clear delineation of when an appointment to government office is cronyism." So much for the vaunted "integrity, service and excellence" core values supposedly cherished by DPM Teo. You know what to think.
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"“possibility of bias” in the procurement".
ReplyDeleteThere are 3 issues:
1) Is this an attempt to trivialise the issue, perhaps shelter it from CPIB's purview by calling it subjective "bias" in decision making, rather than an attempt to collude? You can speak of "bias" when there are 2 or more suppliers submitting tenders, and the purchasing officer chose supplier A over supplier B for whatever reasons. Instead there was only one single submission, which excluded the local Brompton bike authorized agent, or indeed other bike suppliers who might have fulfilled the specifications. remember, the minster said that they did not have any brand in mind, just the specs were listed in the tender. I would say this attempt by MND to firewall ie restrict it to internal disciplinary action falls far short of a government keen to portray itself as corruption-free.
2) In any procurement system (I worked 8 years in procurement), there are 3 parties to a tender process: a) tender handling b) evaluation officer (who might be different from the requesting officer who specified the requirements) and c) approving officer. Where exactly did the system fail? There are issues with calling only 1 supplier to tender and not informing other potential suppliers. Had there not been "any specific brand in mind" as was claimed by Khaw, the tender handling officer should have logically decided to re-open the tender after receiving only 1 tender response which proposed a $2.2k bike. Not only did this not happen, but the other 2 officers (evaluation and approval) both did not question the process and gave their approval, smacked of either gross collusion, or a total lack of procedures. given the frequent raps that Mindef and MoF, Home Affairs regularly receive from the AG's office, I find it improbable that the same lack of procurement discipline were repeated in MND.
3. Why did Lee Bee Wah said that the investigation was focused on procedures and not on price of bike? if the procedures were properly followed, perhaps a lower priced tender satisfying the specifications might have won the bid. Then making the taxper pay $2.2k becomes questionable. Indeed the investigation must be expanded and if the tender found to be illegal, then the whole tender must be annulled and re-tendered. And of course minsters and MPs who defended the earlier decisions must be held accountable, as would the directors (many scholars abound in MND, and MoT, far more than others, trust me) and Perm Secs shpuld all be disciplined for lack of supervisions. If the PAP is ever serious about projecting an image of being corruption free, after so many cases of civil servants' failure to fulfill their duties recently, then cccountability must be enforced all the way down.
Excellent comments from one of many anonymous folks out there.
DeleteAnd Kudos to all who made the dirt come out from under the carpet. Surely we can make a fairer Singapore for the local borns.
Is there a system where all the opening bidding are posted online to make the process more transparent? Don't see anything wrong with this since this is nothing related to sensitive security secrets.
ReplyDeleteMore transparency and accountability is needed from the government!
Lower rank civil servant gets suspended for monkey business. What about higher ranking ones who gets away with mistakes whilst still paid by taxpayers? Any accountability for poor performance?
ReplyDeleteMinister Khaw is quite poor in judging characters I suggest he should not be chairman of PAP,but the social committes as he is nice to Tom,Dick and Mary.
ReplyDeleteRandy, Dick and Fanny
DeleteWhy only one officer suspended? Any award of tender is firstly assessed by a Tender Evaluation Committee (TEC) which then submits its reccommendations to a Tender Award Committee (TEC) which recommends the tender to be awarded.
ReplyDeleteAll the members of TAC and TEC should also be held accountable.
Reminds me of a song by Bruce Springsteen;
ReplyDelete"Dancing In the Dark"
Bernard Lim was chummy pal of Lawrence Lim, founder of Bikehop and winner of the tender. Bernard is a biking enthusiast, obviously a great Brompton fan and owner himself, probably bought from the local agent Diginexx, which is also known to him and other nParks officers. See link below if you have time.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, this again illustrates the bigger problem of lack of accountability in the civil service today. As long as the leaders adopt the attitude of "the buck stops just below me", why would million dollar permanent secretaries bother with the mundane tasks of starting to manage their ministries? They are better off traveling overseas on first class passage, pushing pens on policies that pleases their political masters or advocating billion dollar point-scoring projects like the Gardens at the Bay. After all, like the ping pong cheerleader said, the price of bike is "peanuts" (and she did not add, paid by taxpayers mah)!
http://forums.hardwarezone.com.sg/eat-drink-man-woman-16/csi-attempt-nparks-brompton-procurement-process-ended-up-dodgy-winning-bidder-3814897.html
The buck stops with Bernard Lim if he was the one who initiates and manipulated the entire "biased" procurement. It is unrealistic to expect the entire chain of command to be held accountable -- unless this is a serious breach of security such as Mas Selamat escape. But it should serve an important lessons to Ministers like Khaw, Yaacob & Lui that they should not blindly listen & defend their counterparts and ministries without first fact checking their works, making sure they are beyond scrutiny. It only smacks more collusion and nepotism within the system that utterly erodes the publics trust when public opinion and data emerges later that the people are right all along.
ReplyDeleteQuite interesting your position. The seriousness of the misdeed is the mitigating factor in meting out punishment. But does not help to identify the root causes of the challenge. The principle at issue is whether "the buck stops below me" or "I take responsibility". An apolitical observer must now begin to see that given the large number of cases of misdeeds that surfaced over last few years in the civil service, that the lack of supervision should be the primary cause of our problems. The government (ie the political as well as the supporting bureaucracy)'s stance has always been that all cases are always one-off, hence finding a scapegoat will cure the problems. Now if I were a civil servant or somewhat apathetic Singaporean or a PAP supporter, I could well accept the govt's position.
DeleteI suppose you have a point there.
DeleteAssuming BL is the main initiator of this purchase, he would probably work his persuasion or influence around two immediate levels. ie. one below him (to submit procurement) and one above him (for approval). In a fair scenario, he certainly would take full responsibility, and by subjecting both his direct subordinate & boss who supervises & approve to partial (say 50% of responsibility) this will better send a message to those involved in future procurement, that they have every equal duty to either ensure 'full compliance' or
'whistle-blow", or risk being implicated. That's probably a fail-safe approach, and one that would prevent 'scapegoat only' or 'just carrying out order' punishments.
At end of day, this is a much smaller scale than say a complex transactions that involves hundred-millions of purposeful fraud or deceit. Thus the earlier position that the buck stops with him.
Bromptomgate is a lesson to all civil servants to get their act together. A basic expectation by the people (who pay taxes to the government) is for the civil service to be responsible in the way they use public funds. In the people's mind, public funds are not to be squandered by these stewards. It is not your Ah Gong's money!
ReplyDeleteFrom fraud-lines to fault-lines, I only have this to tell our PM.
ReplyDeleteIf you seriously believe that we are going to depend and count on these new foreigner labors to support our elderlies in the future, you can stop dreaming in your ivory towers.
No self-respected Singaporeans will put up any insults by new foreign guests/new citizens who will shout at the old woman (on priority seats) at top of her voice and said " It's an utter shame when Singapore has such people like you!". Please go ask your PAs to remind them to reflect and look at themselves in the mirror, and stop pointing the fingers and laying the blame on us. This is the last straw. The public should stand up and defend the locals in situation like this, instead of 'minding your own business"!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IjDg_w8raDw&feature=player_embedded
Here is an assignment for Mediacorp and our PA responsible for their successful Integration Program.
DeleteI want to see them film this PRC woman on NDP parade, with hands on her heart, tears in her eyes, reciting our national pledge filled with passion and commitment.
This would be an aspiration indeed.
DeleteI prefer to see this PRC woman look after PM Lee's elderly father.
DeleteHow come this video wasn't featured on STOMP? Oh, I forgot, the STOMP team is made up of PRC imports.
DeleteThey will show how local ah lian is rude to elderly, or local bi-polar boy threaten to push down elderly, but they won't report on local PRC-cum-citizen who are rude to elderly. This one is apparently not-nation-building materials to be reported.
DeleteYa hor. Singapore authorities should be protecting its local born natives. Or are they expecting locals to defend themselves? I still remember the brave ah Gong who fought back the gangsters but himself kena charge instead for self defense. No no wat to say.
DeleteThis Gotham is a fascinating city to visit, though you wouldn't want to live there. I can understand the anger in your bones.
DeleteCan you imagine, all that anger in their old bones?
Did you stop and ask why?
Have viewed the video many times before I can make up the tirades and exchanges.
DeleteConclusion -
1) PRC woman has bi-polar
2) Old woman has menopause
Both very agitated and irritated, and probably sexually repressed. Nice show!
#Singapore authorities should be protecting its local born natives.#
DeleteReturning from holiday this month, I was waiting for my family outside Changi T2 toilet, then this guy asked me what I am standing for (hardly any passengers around, see cameras) and told me I can't wait there. (thinks I am a security threat)
Kind of makes me feel I am not being wanted in this country despite serving the nation by two generations.
The guy in uniform cannot distinguish local/foreign bkz he is a FT.
Perhaps we should look at paying procurement millions in salary, so this episode will not be repeated.
ReplyDeleteGreed knows no end. It is a black hole. Ask the minister why his salary so high and he will say he is sacrificing a higher salary that he can get in privare sector.
DeleteHow ?
ReplyDeleteEven the Minister Of National Development was also once an alien to Sin.
Now, he is a minister in Sin and not oni that, he is a popular and well known one, for wanting old unproductive locals to retire away from their 'chor kay'(country of origin).
Minister Khaw was elected time and again by Sinkies, so is the Prime Minister who kept telling us to integrate with aliens.
patriot
Yes indeed sad that PAP ministers have no compassion for the elderly. Shame on them. They should cut their salary to provide free healthcare and nursing facilities to the elderly.
DeleteThe chief village idiot expects the foreigners to be as stupid as the 60% Sinkies who voted for him.
ReplyDeleteBest "bet" when time is right, they balik kampong with their windfall from selling their properties and withdraw all cpf. Who is looking stupid now?
DeleteThere should be a capital & exit tax for PRs-turned-citizens who subsequently relinquish their citizenships within 10years. This will root out those greedy opportunists who use SG as stepping stone towards their selfish gains.
DeleteChannelnewsasia.com just reported (Posted: 25 July 2012 1613 hrs):
ReplyDelete"The Ministry of National Development (MND) has referred the controversial purchase of 26 Brompton bicycles to the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau (CPIB)."
Wow, just in time for the NDP celebrations!
Aiyah, thought a nparks featuring their staff performing on bromptoms will be a highlight on tv.
DeleteWill Khaw now stand corrected on his blog regarding "value for money", but more specifically, "value for taxpayers' money"?
DeleteThis is a once in 50 year lapse.
DeleteNo amount of engineering in our procurement method can prevent this from happening.
If such purchase of Bromptom bike can be managed like that and yet is value for money, just wonder when it comes to big ticket defence equipment like submarines and missiles how can anyone check if there are improprieties ?
ReplyDeleteWe do know for a fact that murder can take place in other countries if any secret is let out, is ours checkproof ?
Good question. Hope the opposition parties can win more seats in parliament to ask questions like these.
ReplyDeleteThey forgot to add "Accountability" as one of the core values in public service
ReplyDelete