JKR

They're in the limelight, yet again, for the wrong reasons. The Health Ministry is not happy with the excessive delays in the Hospital Sultan Ibrahim, Pandan. Neither is the Education Ministry and Perak State happy with the works done by JKR on the hockey pitch at KL and the Velodrome Rakyat at Ipoh.

Over the years we have seen numerous complaints against JKR, though most were not truly of their fault. Some of the major probs relating to uncompleted buildings e.g Matrade, PMCs (project management companies), were actually not caused by JKR per se. They were just players in that gigantic puzzle of a scheme to enrich some. Decisions are almost always made at the Finance Ministry and JKR were only the monitoring or implementing body.

Well, these are my ignorant simplistic thoughts on JKR. It must be chopped down to size. Its too big and powerful. The federal government has a Jabatan Perkhidmatan Harta dan Penilaian (JPPH) thats filled with valuers and property managers. And yet none of them are involved in the management of the country's physical assets. Perhaps a tiny percentage. Management and maintenance of the assets are almost always under the purview of JKR.

Years ago, the waterworks department within JKR was chopped off and privatised. I believe it is about time that the JPPH is asked to play a major role in managing and maintaining the country's physical assets. The top cannot be lamenting of poor maintenance and then think that the solution is throwing RM500 million or thereabout to Class F contractors in the form of maintenance contracts. There just has to be a structural change in the way things are done here.