The Commission Against Corruption (CCAC) has slammed the Cultural Affairs Bureau (ICM), saying it has been using an illegal method to recruit a large number of its workers, some of whom are even relatives of leaders and department chiefs, according to its investigation report, released last Friday.
The city’s anti-graft watchdog revealed that the Bureau has been avoiding launching open or central recruitment systems to hire its workers in a regulated way, instead doing so via acquisition of services – despite the fact that ‘most of the public departments have avoided hiring workers through acquisition of services in recent years’ following reports from the body or from the Commission of Audit.
The watchdog explained that the reason it initiated the investigation into the Bureau was that: ‘of the reports or complaints concerning the ICM received by CCAC in the recent two years, quite many of them were related to the recruitment of workers or appointment of chiefs’. The period that the anti-graft body looked into covers 2010 to 2015.
According to CCAC, the number of workers recruited by the Bureau via acquisition of services once reached one sixth of the department’s total in 2014, at 112, with the number dropping to 94 in 2016 when the body commenced its investigations into the Bureau.
CCAC pointed out that ‘when the ICM recruited workers through acquisition of services, its recruitment procedures were neither open nor transparent. Also, the recruitment criteria were neither clear nor regulated. Moreover, there were circumstances that the relatives of some leaders and chiefs were able to be recruited by the ICM through acquisition of services,’ the report reads.
The Commission also noted the Bureau’s expenses, including those of the Culture Fund, have increased significantly in the past years – from a total of MOP340 million (US$42.5 million) in 2010, to MOP749.6 million in 2015.
‘As to whether the increased rate of the number of workers and expenses of the ICM was justifiable, and whether the manpower and financial resources were utilised effectively, since they fell outside the jurisdiction of the CCAC and were not the direction of the investigation, CCAC did not have the conditions to make judgment,’ the anti-corruption body pointed out.
Nobody to blame
Advising the Bureau to ensure fairness in its recruitment procedures and to strictly implement the government’s policy of streamlining administration, the Commission, however, did not point out in the report whether any party or individuals should bear any responsibility for the “illegal” recruitment processes.
The cultural bureau was headed by Guilherme Ung Vai Meng from March 2010 until the middle of last month, when he quit to “return to the world of arts”. Then-deputy president Leung Hio Ming has been promoted to become the president of the department.
CCAC said the Bureau had explained that the reason it adopted the “illegal” methods was due to its “heavy workload”, “inadequate manpower” and the “time-consuming recruitment processes”.
But the anti-graft body pointed out that this practice is ‘quite common, systematised and standardised’.
‘Not only did most subunits of the bureau recruit workers through the said method, the recruitment flowchart and the associated document templates were also uploaded to the intranet for reference,’ the Commission wrote. ‘There were even special forms to record the attendance of such workers and for them to apply for annual leave’.
Five crimes
In the report, CCAC indicated the Bureau’s “illegal” method of hiring workers led to five problems: overstepping superior’s personnel management authority; evading the government’s recruitment systems; allowing workers employed via the method to enjoy certain advantages in the open recruitment; creating false fronts to cover up the actual employment relationship; and evading the legal regime of declaration of public servants’ assets and interests.
According to CCAC, the Bureau did not get any approval for exemption from the Secretary for Social Affairs and Culture before adopting the “illegal” recruitment methods, nor had it been greenlighted by the Secretary to exempt the candidates from capacity examinations under these hiring schemes, thus violating local regulations.
‘The selection of candidates by the ICM was only based on resume analyses and interviews […] Without doubt, the ICM had overstepped the superior’s personnel management authority,’ CCAC wrote.
Instead of announcing recruitment news to the public, the Commission found that the Bureau had instead passed the recruitment news to colleagues and friends or by word of mouth in specific areas.
In addition, when the Bureau launched open recruitment, a considerable portion of those being recruited had once worked for the department via acquisitions of services, CCAC noted.
‘The ICM recruited 60 second grade officers in various areas in 2014 and 2015 through open recruitment. Among the final 60 candidates that were recruited, 22 of them had worked in the ICM through acquisition of services,’ the anti-graft body pointed out.
It added that the jury panel for the open recruitment procedure, set the questions for the capacities examination after knowing the resume and identity of the candidates.
“Service providers”
The Commission added that the Bureau has been trying to cover up its actual labour employment relationship with relevant workers via acquisitions of services, and to package the recruitment as procurement of services.
‘The ICM will require the person to be hired to submit a “quotation” for procurement of services, in which the information of the content of “service provided” and “service fee” is exactly the same as the content in the employment proposal,’ the report reads.
Moreover, the Bureau would ask the workers employed by the “illegal” method to submit an application of commencement of work as a freelance worker to the Financial Services Bureau by filling in and submitting M1 salary tax forms.
CCAC criticised that this gave a false impression that the workers were actually freelance workers providing services to the Bureau, rather than full-time staff members, although they ‘were in fact no different from the staff of the ICM’.
Door to corruption
No different from other formal staff, relevant workers recruited under the schemes were assigned to many subordinate departments of the Bureau, including those in charge of the management and financial and administrative operations, as well as those responsible for the planning and operation of building projects, performances and exhibitions, according to the Commission.
‘Therefore, they had access to, and even had the chance to take part in, the planning or administrative assessment procedures of the projects and events involving significant economic interests,’ the body pointed out in the report.
‘However, they did not fulfil the obligation to declare their assets and interests. This would not only open a loophole in the supervision of integrity of the public service but also bring about risks of corruption’ it added.
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ICM: pays serious attention to the report
In a statement last Friday, the Cultural Affairs Bureau said it is paying serious attention to the CCAC report, claiming it would reorganise its human resources or other administrative issues following its comprehensive investigations into the problems.
‘[The Bureau] will obey CCAC’s advice, adopting measures meeting local regulations to improve the problems covered in the report,’ it wrote.
Meanwhile, the Office of the Secretary for Social Affairs and Culture said in a separate statement that it has ordered the Bureau to submit a detailed report on the measures it has carried out or is planning to carry out, in order to remedy the situation.
The Secretary also ordered relevant workers at the Bureau to declare their assets and interests as required by law.
