Prime Minister Thongloun Sisoulith has called on the Ministry of Home Affairs to adhere to scientific ways in the development of governance and administration, with their strong roots developed from an early stage.
Mr Thongloun made the call yesterday in his address at the annual meeting of the ministry to review the achievements in the past year and discuss the plan for the future.
He spoke about the country as a body, which he said has an architectural structure.
If the architectural structure has strong fundaments, we will not need to modify it in the future, Mr Thongloun said.
We should build the foundation as strong as possible because it would be better if only little modifications are made through necessity, he added.
Prime Minister Thongloun stressed for any change not be made based on the desire of an individual, but accompanied by scientific discussion and consultation, research and analysis.
He commented some mistakes were allowed concerning this sector in the past, especially the arrangement of unnecessary jobs for people, saying this would have long term effects.
Arrangement of unnecessary jobs or posts has been made so that someone could be employed. This caused the gradual expansion of the organisational structure, which at last become ineffective, Mr Thongloun said.
He suggested that not all ministries and government agencies at the central level should have subordinate departments or offices in provinces and districts as these have consumed a considerable proportion of the state budget.
Developing a more streamlined organisational structure and building transparency in the public service as well as personnel development were noted by the prime minister for the ministry to make more efforts in breaking through.
Mr Thongloun called on the ministry to ensure the clear delineation of jobs, while noting that recruitment needs to be strict in terms of sourcing competent people, who have good attributes, quality of knowledge and skills and responsibilities.
He said he supported the children of government officials, children of retired officials and participants of the revolutionary movement being promoted for recruitment but they should be developed to be competent and serve as r ole models in any organisation.
However, he added, if the children do not have competency, their promotion could be harmful. In the same way, Mr Thongloun spoke about sending a student of a low grade to study at a high standard university, saying he would become a fool in the face of the difficulties.
In his address, Prime Minister Thongloun revealed that he has ordered that all salaries be paid on time for soldiers, police officers, teachers and medical staff, while stressing that the budget allocated for salary payments not be used for other purposes.
He suggested that the budget funding allocated for other purposes can be used by authorities for salary payments if the salary budget is not ready.
He also proposed that salaries be paid through ATMs even at the district level, where the service is available, noting that offenders concerning the slowness of salary payments in their sectors will be punished.
Source: Vientiane Times
