KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 24 — The termination of all politically appointed chairmen and board members of government-linked companies (GLCs), statutory bodies and state-investment funds is a great start to ensuring good governance of these organisations, agreed three economists that Malay Mail spoke to recently.

They said that the terminations will allow the organisations in question to avoid political interference from the government of the day as well as vested business interests from politicians.

“The other question is the competency of those appointed,” said Prof Yeah Kim Leng.

“We want to ensure the professionalism of the corporate sectors, especially those involving government agencies.

“So only exceptional individuals should be allowed in these positions, who have the necessary knowledge of the industry and skills to steer the organisations,” added the director of the Economic Studies Programme at the Jeffrey Cheah Institute on South-east Asia at Sunway University.

Yet, these terminations are just the tip of the iceberg, with more changes needed to ensure that the government’s current direction will last, said the economists.

Lee Heng Guie, executive director of the Socio-Economic Research Centre, said that currently there are no laws prohibiting the appointment of politicians on the boards of public limited companies, including GLCs.

“The government can consider formulating an Act to govern the appointments to GLC boards, with the setting up of a Parliamentary Select Committee to oversee the vetting and selection process of appointees,” he said.

Yeah concurred, saying that if a law is set up and the selection process is made in a transparent manner, and those appointed are selected based on their competency and integrity, then even politicians can be appointed in “exceptional” situations.

“There are some very qualified politicians as well, and we do not want to miss out on their talent, when possible,” he said.

Meanwhile, Barjoyai Bardai said that ideally, there should be more separation between the government of the day and these GLCs, statutory bodies, and state investment funds.

“For example, all GLCs could be put under the single management of an institution separate from the government, with the whole Malaysian citizenship listed as a beneficiary of the institution,” he said.

He added that some profits from the proposed GLC management institution could go towards adding social protection for citizens.

On December 15, news reports confirmed that Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim's government had sacked all chairmen and board members of GLCs, statutory bodies and state-investment funds who were political appointments.

The move was in stark contrast to the previous administrations of Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob and Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin.

Local think tank Institute for Democracy and Economic Affairs (Ideas) had noted that over 230 political appointments were made between August 2021 and September 2022, when Ismail Sabri was the prime minister.

Ideas said that 119 of those appointments were new, while 115 were retained from the previous government under Muhyiddin.

It was speculated that these appointments were made to provide an incentive for politicians to support the respective government administrations.