Thursday December 29, 2011
Assessing councillors
By CHRISTINA CHIN
sgchris@thestar.com.my
A GROUP of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) has sent an e-mail questionnaires to 23 Penang municipal councillors, asking them to list down three major achievements this year.
The questionnaires were sent last week under the 'Know Your Councillor' campaign for Penang ratepayers to get to know their councillors.
Suara Rakyat Malaysia (Suaram) Penang, Sembang Forum and Coalition for Good Governance Penang committee member Tan Seng Hai said the objective of the campaign was to promote local democracy and local election.
"The replies would be made public next month.
"Penang has the oldest municipal council in the country.
"Municipal councillors were once elected by ratepayers but this practice has been abolished since the 1960's.
"Councillors are now selected and appointed by the state government based on allocations to political parties, giving rise to situations where politically appointed councillors have to toe their party's line (but) the public expects councillors to serve the interests of ratepayers," he said yesterday.
Besides listing down three major accomplishments this year, the councillors were also asked to reveal three main goals if reappointed next year and why they deserve to be reappointed.
Tan said the campaign was in line with the state government's CAT (competency, accountability and transparency) principles and would help ratepayers understand the roles and functions of the councillors.
The 10 councillors from DAP, eight from PKR, two from PAS, two from chambers of commerce and two from NGOs, were sworn in 11 months ago.
"We hope that the councillors will respond by Jan 5 before the new councillor list is announced. So far, I haven't received a single reply," Tan said.
He said the e-mail had also been forwarded to State Local Government and Traffic Management Committee chairman Chow Kon Yeow and MPPP president Patahiyah Ismail.
"We are concentrating on the MPPP this year.
"Next year, we may include the Seberang Prai Municipal Council (MPSP), MPs and assemblymen in a similar campaign," he said.
No comments:
Post a Comment