Tan Kin Lian's Blog: Which government agency is responsible?

Saturday, September 05, 2009

Which government agency is responsible?

A journalist asked me: "Mr. Tan, as motor insurance fraud have been quite rampant, which government agency should address this problem? Should it be MAS or the Land Transport Authority?

I replied that this is a shameful state of affairs. There is only one Government in Singapore. How can one agency (or department or ministry) point its fingers towards another agency to solve the problem? At the end, no agency take responsibility and the problem remains unsolved.

Finger pointing is now so prevalent that it now becomes a Singapore culture to avoid responsibility. If the people at the top behave in this manner, why should the people lower down do differently?

Many scams and cheating are not investigated, even if complaints are lodged. The Government officer ask the complainant to "provide evidence" before they will act. It is difficult for the ordinary people to provide hard evidence, as they can only be carried out by the Police with the powers and resources to carry out investigation into suspected crimes.

Quite often, the complaints are usually just filed away and investigation is not carried out. Our Government officers prefer to sit behind the desk to write papers, rather than go out to investigate.

This has developed into a habit for the past 15 years and has led to an increase in cheating cases, not only with motor insurance claims but also in investments and other areas.

Tan Kin Lian

3 comments:

Anonymous said...: Perhaps the most blatant of cheating cases in recent memory may be found in the Collective Sale of the Gillman Heights Condominium worth more than $500 million. NUS was a majority owner of GH (about 50%). On 3 May 2007, GH applied to the Strata Titles Board (STB) for the collective sale and formal approval by STB was granted in December 2007. The sale completion for GH was 20 March 2008. Legally, this is the GH transaction period on record.

Meanwhile, NUS privately acquired a 15% stake in Ankerite, the purchasing entity by 15 May 2007 (we should assume that there were ongoing discussions before that date) while the transaction was ongoing. Ankerite signed a Statutory Declaration for No Conflict of Interest dated 10 April 2007 as required by STB but made no attempt to update it throughout the process. Neither the STB nor the other co-owners were aware of the side arrangement.

The side arrangement was only exposed in the High Court hearings in March 2008. However, the presiding judge saw fit NOT to direct the STB to re-consider the transaction even after the massive conflict of interest was uncovered and even as STB has the legislative responsibility to check specifically on the conflict of interest in this matter.; September 05, 2009 9:56 AM
Anonymous said...: Maybe they are short of manpower and therefore overwhelmed by the problems.

So they prioritise. These problems maybe of a lower priority hence nothing much done.

Maybe they do what is more crucial like securing 66% mandate and 98% seats.; September 05, 2009 5:15 PM
Anonymous said...: It is a common corporate practice to outsource non-core business functions.

If "taking responsibility and action" is no longer a core function of a government agency, perhaps it's time to outsource it to a customer service centre in India or China.; September 06, 2009 9:29 AM