Funding discrepancies exposed in report by AG raises ire

July 15, 2009

in Singapore,Start-ups & Entrepreneurship

Although social media can be (and has proven to be) swifter than traditional media, one ultimately still has to rely on mainstream media when it comes to information from our government. Earlier today, the Straits Times reported on some sloppy management of public monies (yours and mine, yes!) by some civil servants in Singapore. The Attorney-General running the Attorney-General Office (AGO) – auditor of all government agencies (including Temasek and GIC) – detailed its findings annually in a public report that expouses better governance and value-for-money by civil servants in the management of public funds. In the article, the A-G said that some civil servants were “lax in managing funds and had opted for convenience.”

The Evidence

Report of the Auditor-General for the Financial Year 2008/2009

View more documents from motochan.

Raised Ire

I‘ve heard mumblings and rumblings going on for a while now, so I can’t say I was terribly surprised after scanning the report myself. Soon after, one of my contacts within my Facebook network let off much of his pent-up frustration over the issue. It sounded like he had first-hand experience. Although I did not comment in the following note, I thought the ensuing conversation was sufficiently interesting and representative of the grassroot feelings shared by local entrepreneurs, and hence certainly worth highlighting. I think I know who the antagonist is…though you won’t be getting any names out of me! Read on!

The agencies have promised the A-G to tighten their processes. MDA is, among other things, introducing a system to track revenues from film projects.

“Sloppy Civil Servants“, The Straits Times, 15 July 2009

Let’s hope everyone will get a better grade come same time next year! In the meantime, I do hope the miscreants get taken to task, even if it ends up as a mild rap on their palms. After all, I do pay my taxes on time! I have a share in those misused monies! *waves fists*

Share and Enjoy:

5 Tweets 12 Other Comments

{ 18 comments… read them below or add one }

1 jiinjoo July 15, 2009 at 10:08 PM

So, this “asshole” you mentioned, is he named in public yet? shaming with no naming isn’t going to work…

Reply More from author

2 James Chan July 16, 2009 at 12:03 AM

@jiinjoo no his name is not mentioned YET. I won’t be the one doing the honours though…the circle is awfully small

Reply More from author

3 iownmydata July 16, 2009 at 1:36 AM

Makes me wonder – that if the community had whistleblown (come on – most of us already knew what was really happening) – would we have stopped this ridiculous spectacle?

Now what is really worrying me is that all your MDA/SPRING/EDB is going to be really conservative and slow in funding – that would hardly help the entrepreneurial community which is really just about maturing and showing some success?

Reply

4 ErniesUrn July 16, 2009 at 11:14 AM

NUS Enterprise? Any incentives for providing clues? Just curious..

Reply

5 James Chan July 20, 2009 at 2:48 PM: Tough luck, I won’t be the one blowing the whistle without any hard facts from first-party and official sources. It’s not professional and nice any other way.

Reply More from author

6 Panzer July 16, 2009 at 5:19 PM

It’s the Auditor-General’s Office (AGO) NOT Attorney General’s Chambers (AGC).

http://www.ago.gov.sg

Cheers.

Reply More from author

7 James Chan July 16, 2009 at 5:47 PM: Good point Panzer, missed that one. Fixed!

Reply More from author

8 Christoph Zrenner July 16, 2009 at 10:27 PM

I’m surprised about the “mumblings and rumblings” regarding the MDA iJam programme; maybe it’s because I’m still an outsider to Singapore that I don’t have access to these kind of things; or maybe there are differences between the incubators. Just wanted to say that my experience as an MDA/iJam incubatee company (Wildfire) has been entirely positive. The application process was transparent and professional and the incubator has been a tremendous source of support for us, and not just financially. In fact, what I see happening in Singapore in terms of start-up “energy” (iMatch workshops, incubator mentorship, community of entrepreneurs meeting in the F11 space, …) is the reason that our start-up venture is now headquartered in Singapore rather than Shanghai or Hong Kong.
Maybe I don’t understand the real issue that is being raised, but it looks to me like MDA/iJam’s 50k is giving young people with ideas and passion the chance to give it a shot to make it real. Sure thing, new ideas start out immature, many projects fail and the incubators have a tough and thankless job guiding the learning process as mentors. But as long as those people who are serious about entrepreneurship in Singapore get the support they need to just do it, then the programme seems to be working.
I guess all I want to add to this thread is: Go Incubators, go MDA, go Singapore, you’re doing a good and important thing!

Reply

9 James Chan July 20, 2009 at 2:48 PM: Agree totally with you, Christopher. I for one support MDA’s initiatives and vision wholly – we’re all for the good of Singapore and its nascent IDM industry, and for the ASEAN region for that matter!

I’m guessing the release of the AG report triggered some underlying unhappiness by folks who’ve witnessed (either first- or second-hand) what they deem as mismanagement of public funds by one or more agents of MDA’s Micro-Funding Scheme (MFS), and are taking the opportunity to vent and assert that there is more dirt yet to be uncovered.

Reply More from author

10 Meng Weng Wong July 17, 2009 at 12:53 AM

I just hope we don’t get a chilling effect. Most of the startups in iJam will fail, and it’s understood that the government is not really taking risks as an investor, but deploying funds for public policy reasons. I would be disappointed if this increased scrutiny caused fewer iJam funds to be awarded. The overt conflicts of interest can easily be curtailed without hurting the others.

Reply More from author

11 Jeff July 20, 2009 at 2:30 AM

James, your post is solid and well covered. Remembered we talked about this whole thing surfacing? enough talk from all of us, the ijam program is a good one (intention wise), the people running it is not. so remove the people at mda who are doing this or install a revamp of the program.
as far as the miscue on the mentor, throw the book at him asap, and either close the mentor company up or have another or a new group take over and carry out the process properly.
intentions are right, approach is wrong. Michael and team is not equipped period, they can fix it, its not rocket science.

Reply More from author

12 a July 20, 2009 at 2:08 PM

James: I heard MDA posted a response to this in the newpapers on Sunday (19 Jul). I didn’t manage to get a copy. Are you allowed to reproduce it here?

btw, how did the author of the FB thread get info like $350K advancement? Didn’t see that anywhere in the AGO report. So its just guesswork? Also from what i know, Mentors are SUPPOSED to get advancements (so they don’t have to keep going back to mda for claims?) ALL the mentors, not just any particular one. It just seems like the author took some basic facts, and then wrote it in a manner particularly (and with no other purpose than) to incite anger and controversy.

It is important that our gov agencies are careful with managing taxpayer’s money. But if they were to make sure every single i is dotted and t is crossed before disbursing any money, I don’t know how many start-ups would have already died while waiting for a mere $50K to arrive in their bank account.

Like Meng said, I too would be disappointed if increased scrutiny caused fewer iJam funds/companies to be awarded. It would just completely defeat the purpose of the program to seed and educate as many entrepreneurs as we can.

*disclaimer: my company received iJAM funding.

Reply

13 James Chan July 20, 2009 at 2:43 PM

I wasn’t in town, missed their response. However, I saw a post with a scan of a continuation of news coverage on this matter on Sunday. Will try and make sense of it all once I’m all settled from my BKK trip.

Don’t know about the accuracy of the S$350k advancement – would attribute it to hearsay for now.

Would really hate to see any chilling effect resulting from this – fwiw, the MFS is a programme with good intentions. It’s just suffering from some mismanagement and bad PR right now. Still, I feel there’s no smoke without fire. The relevant authorities should dig a ‘lil deeper to ensure that everything’s clean and proper.

Conflict of interests are a big boo boo when it comes to public monies.

Reply More from author

14 a July 21, 2009 at 1:01 AM: thanks for posting the MDA response. yeah there are good lessons to learn from this. clean and proper management for sure, and also (like you pointed out) a faster response would have been more effective damage control.

Reply

15 M0T0chan July 15, 2009 at 5:55 PM