Hun Sen: government spent too much on civil servants' salary

By Khmerization
Source: RFA

Prime Minister Hun Sen is unhappy that his government spent too much money on paying the salary of civil servants, reports Radio Free Asia.

Speaking on 17th March in a meeting to hear the reports about the government's 2009 achievements, Mr. Hun Sen has ordered all ministries to stop recruiting more staff in an attempt to save money. He said only teachers and medical staff are allowed to be recruited. "Only teachers and medical staff are allowed to be recruited. In other institutions, if they have 100 staff and if 30 staff retired, 70 are kept and they won't be allowed to recruit any more staff because past expenditures have exceeded our micro-budget", he said.

Mr. Hun Sen also said in the past, expenditures on civil servants' perks such as free petrol, phone bills, allowances, accommodation, food and travelling expenses on overseas missions have exceeded the micro-budget. He said from now on, if necessary, ambassadors and diplomats in Cambodia's overseas missions will attend the conferences and meetings in the countries they are based in instead of sending officials from Cambodia in order to save the money.

According to government figures, expenditures on civil servants' perks is equivalent to 4.4% of Cambodia's Growth Domestic Product (GDP), which is considered too high for any country.

Mr. Yim Sovan (pictured), spokesman for the opposition Sam Rainsy Party, said there are corruption involving in applying for allowances and perks from many government officials. "They inflate the invoices. They only received one invoice, but they presented two invoices (for reimbursements) and sometimes they inflated the invoices three times higher than the real charges in the invoices because they connived with the service providers and vendors. This has caused the government to lose a lot of money because there is no control put in place. This is only the tip of the iceberg and this is not a new issue, it is an old issue, so it is good that (Mr. Hun Sen) has raised the issue. So, we want to see his words become a reality and we wish that these words are transormed into concrete measures in order to tackle unnecessary expenditures and to save our National Budget because all these money are coming from the sweat and blood of our citizens", he said.

The opposition parties have in the past accused the government of unnecessarily recruiting hundreds of civil servants every year but it has never made the figures public. Mr. Yim Sovan also appeal to the government to punish those officials who inflate the invoices in the past.