KUALA LUMPUR, March 12 — The low number of non-Bumiputera officers in the country’s civil service is due to the relatively low number of job applicants from those ethnic groups when compared to the Malays, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Shahidan Kassim said today.

Shahidan pointed out that over 1.2 million of the country’s majority Malay community sought to join the civil service last year, outstripping those from other ethnicities including the Chinese.

“For your information, the number of non-Bumiputera officers, including those of Chinese ethnicity, is due to the low number of applications from them to serve in the public service.

“Based on data on applications to enter public service, in 2014, (the number of) applications by Malays are as many as 1,233,002 (78.9 per cent) while the Chinese applicants are 31,719 (two per cent) only,” the minister said in a parliamentary reply to DAP’s Bakri MP Er Teck Hwa.

Shahidan also told Er to look at this issue in light of the fact that the private sector was “dominated by only one race when compared to other races”, but did not state which ethnic group he was referring to.

The DAP MP had asked the prime minister to state the annual ethnic composition in the civil service in ministries and government agencies for the years 2010 to 2014.

In the same parliamentary reply, the Prime Minister’s Department said there are over 1.6 million officers in the entire civil service covering ministries and agencies, as of December 2014.

Out of this 1,606,463 figure, 78.8 per cent are Malays, while 6.1 per cent and 4.8 per cent are Bumiputera from Sabah and Sarawak respectively, with the Chinese and Indians accounting for 5.2 per cent and 4.1 per cent respectively.

Another 0.3 per cent and 0.7 per cent were from other Bumiputera groups and ethnicities.

But if the civil servants in the armed forces and police force are not included in the calculation, 77.7 per cent are Malays, while 6.4 per cent and 4.5 per cent are Bumiputera from Sabah and Sarawak respectively, with the Chinese and Indians accounting for 6.2 per cent and 4.4 per cent respectively.

Those from other Bumiputera groups and ethnicities will be 0.2 and 0.6 per cent respectively, it said.

The Prime Minister’s Department further said the distribution of the total 1,450,041 officers among ministries and agencies are “according to needs and their roles irrespective of race”.