Why Should Malaysia Have An Elected System Of Local Government Administration

The answer for the question is yes, Malaysia should practice an elected system in selecting councilors. The first reason is to giving back the right of the people to elect their leaders of local government. Section 15 of Local Government Act 1976 states the suspension of Local Government election. According to items four and five of the Ninth Schedule of Federal Constitution, local government other than those in the Federal Territories (Kuala Lumpur, Labuan and Putrajaya) are subjects under state list and directly under the exclusive jurisdiction of the state government. In other words, local government is subjected under state level and their authorities are appointed by the state government leaders.
However, the biggest argument on the
It is only with election system that people can participate effectively in selecting their local officers and ensure that they will shape the best policy and strategy plan for them. This is because appointment system leads the appointed councilors to follow the order from those who appoint them. It is kind of culture for them to obey the order from the state authorities who appoint them as the councilors. In contra, elected council will be more accountable and represent the voice of the people since they were chose by the majority of the people. Other than that, if the selected officers are not performing well in governing the people, the people will have the power to choose other authorities to represent them on the next election. Since the right to elect is in the hands of the people and not in the hands of the government, it will always make the people to be at first priority of the local authorities. Thus, election system will make the local authorities to win the heart of the people by serving and taking care of the people’s
Collusion is a secret agreement for illegal purposes or in other word is the conspiracy. Meanwhile, nepotism means the favoring of relative or personal friends because of their relationship rather than because of their ability. For example, the Selayang Municipal Council president chaired a meeting which appointed his daughter as a permanent administrator in the council. However, when the Malay Mail which reported on the issue, asked the Selayang state assemblyman about it, the state leader did not want to be involved in it. The high rate of nepotism will lead to another serious issue of governance such as authorities with lack ability and unfairness issue. As for the corruption, according to The Star Newspaper, Malaysia has climbed up three places in the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) table for 2014. Malaysia scored 52 points in the CPI and was ranked 50th out of 175 countries. It may due to lack of transparency in Malaysia governance. Thus, by re-introducing back the election system in local level, it might help and could be one of the efforts to increase the transparency of government administration and therefore reduce the Corruption Perception Index in