KUCHING: Sarawak United People’s Party (SUPP) Central Youth chief, Michael Tiang believes that a balanced civil service with ethnic diversity is also a matter of basic fairness as well as key to the effective operation of our state government.
Tiang said in a racial composition in our state civil service must not only be based on meritocracy. when asked to respond to the recent statement made by Datuk Talib Zulpilip, the Minister in the Chief Minister’s Department that the composition of the state’s civil service is based on meritocracy.
He said his party president, Datuk Dr. Sim Kui Hian, had on many occasions been appealing for a fairer and healthier race composition in our state’s civil service particularly when speaking in the august House and agreed with Datuk Talib Zulpilip that when it comes to recruitment of civil servants in the public sector, the merits of each applicant must be carefully considered by Public Service Commission (PSC).
“However, in a multi-ethnic society like our Sarawak, we do need all races to join the public sector so as to serve the needs of all races in different aspects and regions,” Tiang said.
He gave an illustration: “Just imagine at a government office in Kapit whereby the majority of local residents are Dayaks, if we don’t have any Dayak officers stationed there to communicate with the Dayak locals from Kapit, I believe that office would not be able to serve the local people effectively.
”Therefore we must encourage people from diverse racial backgrounds to be involved in the public sector and together we can get better services that work for everyone,” added Tiang.
“On the other hand, I would also like to encourage Chinese not to shy away from serving in the public sector and to view working in the civil service as their last option. Chinese must also play a pivotal role in our state civil service so as to assist the Sarawak government to attain the goal of being an administration truly for all,” he pointed out.
