PM: Gov't achieves all KPI

All the six National Key Result Areas (NKRAs), introduced to gauge government performance, have achieved the Key Performance Index (KPI) set, Prime Minister Najib Razak said today.

The government had introduced the six NKRAs in July last year to reduce crime, fight corruption, improve student outcomes, raise living standards of low-income households, improve rural basic infrastructure and improve urban public transport.

Najib cited the example of how members of the People's Volunteer Corps (Rela) and Department of Civil Defence had been deployed, along with the policemen, to conduct patrols to achieve the objectives of the NKRA on crime reduction.

He said, more than 7,000 police officers and men working in the office had "returned" to their core duty to be close with the people, while their task at the office was carried out by more than 4,000 civil servants.

In the first quarter of this year, the crime index had dropped 15.1 percent while street crimes were down by 39.6 per cent compared to the corresponding period last year, he said.

Malaysia enters list of top 10 most competitive countries in the world

For the first time, Malaysia has earned a position among the 10 most competitive countries in the world, according to the 2010 World Competitiveness Yearbook(WCY), published by the Swiss-based Institute for Management Development (IMD).

Malaysia has steadily improved its rating since first included in IMD’s well-respected World Competitiveness Yearbook in 1999 and achieved especially impressive gains in the competitiveness ranking this year, moving up eight positions to break into the top ten.

With an index score of 87.228, Malaysia has joined the ranks of the most competitive countries in the world, sharing the top 10 ranking with Singapore, Hong Kong, the United States, Switzerland, Australia, Sweden, Canada, Taiwan and Norway.

This unprecedented result is clearly rooted in the innovative and bold initiatives the government has undertaken this past year to drive development and economic growth and create a resilient private sector, despite the recent slowdown of the global economy. This is a result that demonstrates how public/private collaboration works and serves as a foundation for strong, stable and inclusive growth.

The remarkable advancement in Government Efficiency rating, where Malaysia moved up 10 positions from 2009, from 19th to 9th, demonstrates that the Government Transformation Program (GTP) is beginning to deliver results.

The GTP, launched last year, has focused government efforts in key areas, such as enhancing the business climate, fighting corruption, improving the infrastructure, streamlining government procedures and strengthening our education system.

While the government has implemented the right policies to improve competitiveness, Malaysian entrepreneurs have played a vital role in leveraging this business climate to create change and drive growth. This Yearbook is a testament to their efforts showing a Business Efficiency rating that increased by nine positions to a ranking of 4th from 13th.

In both the Government and Business Efficiency ratings, Malaysia’s performance is now ahead of developed countries such as Luxembourg, Switzerland, Canada, Denmark and Sweden.

As the Prime Minister highlighted in the announcement of the New Economic Model, it is this ‘new way of doing things’ that is driving Malaysia to the ambitious goal of becoming a fully developed nation by 2020. Improving physical and soft infrastructure is the foundation of our strong performance.

Malaysia will continue to seek inputs from the private sector to create synergies and strong partnerships with all Malaysian businesses, ranging from GLCs to SMEs.

The marked improvement in rankings is a result of the implementation of the economic dimension of the 1Malaysia concept, where ‘People First, Performance Now’ means working together to demonstrate the growing confidence that the global markets are giving to Malaysia.

There are still areas where more work is needed: the Government has to continue to improve its service delivery system, to strengthen high quality investments, to groom SMEs for global competition and, very importantly, to keep nurturing the innovative and creative mindset of our people.