Many in Third World countries complain of poor performance in the public sector and the length of time it takes to complete even the simplest job. In my opinion, much of this has to do with language. One reason behind this inefficiency is that people do not stick to the root meaning of the Arabic word. This may surprise some but let me explain. The meaning of “official” is a person who is required to explain his or her actions — and the official is accountable for those actions.
In many Third World countries, this is certainly not the case. The definition of an official is a person who is never asked why something was done. There is no accountability at all. Low salaries and incentives offered in the public sector have made it a refuge for those who come and go and do as they wish, following their moods and inclinations, knowing they will not be questioned. The public sector must be changed if the country is to develop and prosper. Why don’t we run this sector in the same way the private sector is run?
The first lesson when running a private business is, if possible, to have one person do the work of two or even three. This is not the case in the public sector where offices overflow with employees who spend most of the day reading newspapers, sipping tea and torturing the public with unnecessary and meaningless delays. And they do this simply to pass the time. Some may say the public sector provides jobs for many people.
We should recall here that Caliph Omar ibn Al-Khattab used to make welfare payments from the Public Treasury to every disabled and unemployed Muslim. We might follow his example and begin paying the unemployed until they find work. This would save us from filling government offices with large numbers of people who probably are not needed and who certainly do very little work.
These are fundamentals. We don’t need professors of business administration and committees to develop plans to improve workers’ efficiency and productivity. The simplest tactic would be to apply the carrot and stick policy: those who work hard are rewarded while the lazy are told they are not immune from punishment and are in danger of losing their jobs.
Why not fire those public sector employees who are continually and willfully negligent and insist on violating work rules? Where did we get the idea of doing nothing and getting paid for it? No doubt, it is rooted in some un-Islamic administrative systems.
The wise caliphs in the early years of Islam did not hesitate to fire a public employee who did not do his work as required or who abused their authority. What makes us blindly follow the opposite system? Is it because we inherited it from those before us and have become victims of the mistaken “This is the way it’s always been” syndrome?
