17 June 2012
Editor
Forum Page
Straits Times
Over the past decades, Singapore has built up a good reputation for being
relatively free of corrupt practices.
The two recent cases of alleged indiscretions involving the award of I.T.
software contracts has exposed a weakness in our system. The people involved
in negotiating and recommending the contacts are often reporting
to the people who take the decision in the award of the contracts.
I suggest that the award of contracts above a certain sum, say $250,000, should be decided
by an independent panel of knowledgeable persons who are independent of the actual operations.
Suitable people for this panel are retired civil servants or business leaders who are people of repute,
have held past senior positions in the respective fields, are no longer in active occupation
and are free of any potential conflict of interest. A different panel could be formed for each tender award.
These members of the panel should be paid a respectable honorarium for the time that
they that have to spend to make the decision. As the amounts involved are large, the
cost of this layer of decision making could be justified by the potential saving in
preventing corrupt practices.
Tan Kin Lian
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