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Big salary hikes hope to inspire better, cleaner city governance
Applying a carrot and stick approach, earlier this month the Jakarta administration increased the take-home pay for all civil servants and established some new rules that will regulate the salary
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Applying a carrot and stick approach, earlier this month the Jakarta administration increased the take-home pay for all civil servants and established some new rules that will regulate the salary.
Governor Basuki 'Ahok' Tjahaja Purnama said he expected the higher salary to boost performance and discourage the illegal levying of fees or other forms of corruption from civil servants.
'Higher pay means higher performance. I don't want to see anymore slacking-off from these officials. If their performance is unsatisfactory or even mediocre, they will be demoted. We can easily find a replacement; it's as simple as that,' Ahok announced at City Hall on Thursday.
Data from the Employment Agency shows that district heads received the highest increase in take-home pay to Rp 44,284,000 (US$3,509) from Rp 14,874,000; or over three times the old salary.
The drastic increase in take-home pay is due to the city's new payment system, where civil servants receive compensation based on performance. Pay is categorized as either 'dynamic' or 'static'. The dynamic kind of pay, distributed every three months, depends on work performance. When an official fails to meet a certain target, for example, the administration will reduce the pay.
Meanwhile, the static kind of pay is unconditioned by performance, and is determined only by daily attendance and appraisals from supervisors. Static pay is distributed in the middle of each month.
Ahok added that the city had already demoted several officials who had recently been promoted in the inauguration ceremony of Jan. 2 after receiving negative reports from coworkers and residents.
'This is not a game,' Ahok warned.
Separately, Jakarta Inspectorate Lasro Marbun said the city was currently preparing a new regulation regarding the payment system. He said that under the new policy, civil servants' take-home pay would be reduced by Rp 500,000 ($39) for each minute they were late to
the office.
Payment for all civil servants in a particular working unit would also be reduced by 10 percent for a period of two months if illegal taxes were found to have been levied by just one officer within the unit.
'We hope this system will greatly reduce the common practice of illegal levies within the administration,' Lasro said.
Meanwhile, public policy expert Agus Pambagio said the administration needed to provide strict supervision and continue scrutinizing civil servants or the new payment system would be rendered ineffective.
'Higher payment does not necessarily guarantee high performance or clean governance; supervision does. Therefore, the city must strictly supervise all its civil servants and set [specific] targets for them,' Agus told The Jakarta Post over the phone on Thursday.
During the last two years, the administration attempted to reform the city's bureaucracy, widely considered one of the most corrupt in the archipelago. The city recently inaugurated thousands of new officials who were chosen by open recruitment.
