JEDDAH: The flight of skilled workers from the government sector to the private sector is a healthy phenomenon found in various countries, Minister of Civil Service Abdul Rahman Al-Barrak said.
“An employee moving from one job to another, one department to another, or the public sector to the private sector in the Kingdom need not be considered a drain, but prompted mostly by some personal considerations,” Al-Barrak, who is also chairman of the board of directors of the Institute of Public Administration, said in an interview published recently in the Civil Service Magazine.
The minister added that if a Saudi worker leaves the government sector for a private company, it is not a loss because the private company is fulfilling its need without recruiting a foreigner.
The minister also stressed the need for every department to have experienced personnel to fill the gap created by the departure of an employee. “There could be many reasons why an employee leaves his job. It may be because of his decision to quit the job or some worker going on retirement, so a department should have substitute workers who can fill the vacancy so that its work is not adversely affected,” he said.
The minister said his ministry, which is responsible for public sector employment, should adopt advanced civil service methods in order to ensure the better efficiency of the administrative machine. “Development process in the civil service sector is a continuous function and it has no limit. The ministry is currently examining itself so that it can identify the best methods to develop its various mechanisms related to work performance, and achieve the goals for which the ministry was established,” he said, adding that the ministry’s reform activities needed some time to show results.
The ministry exercises its authority and makes amendments on the basis of the 10th clause of the Regulations of the Civil Service Council. The clause gave the ministry the authority to monitor implementation of regulations and statutes, and conduct studies related to their implementation besides submitting proposals for amendments and new regulations to the Civil Service Council, he said. While it made such recommendations, the ministry also took into account media observations, suggestions from other government departments and the difficulties faced while implementing current regulations, he added.
He said his ministry recently made a comprehensive scrutiny of all the executive statutes of the civil service regulations. “It resulted in making amendments to 21 statutes and regulations in the civil service laws. The latest of them was the statute of the financial rights, which was approved by a royal order last year. The review of the statutes is completed in collaboration with the human resources departments in various government departments in addition to consulting legal experts and academics.”
The minister, who stressed the Council of Civil Service’s role in improving the country’s civil service system, said the council issued 3,000 orders regarding the improvement or amendment of the regulations besides continuing its ongoing efforts to discover the best means to improve the services.
Speaking on a question about what the ministry can do to end the sufferings of school teachers who have to travel long distances between their homes and work places, the minister said the ministry’s role was confined to announcing job opportunities and selecting the candidates on the basis of their merit and their choice of the location of the school.
He also said the recommendations of the Institute of Public Administration are not binding on the government. The civil service ministry may or may not accept the recommendations. However the recommendations help develop the administrative concepts and also to identify difficulties and ways to tackle them.
Flight of govt employees to private sector ‘healthy sign’
