KUCHING: The Dayak Round Table (DRT) movement is throwing a challenge to Datuk Talib Zulpilip, the Minister in the Chief Minister’s Office (Integrity and Ombudsman), to a debate on the composition of the State Civil Service which he had insisted was based on meritocracy.
A news portal reported that Talib had defended the composition of the civil service, insisting that it was based on meritocracy and challenged those who disagreed to come up with the ‘facts and figures’.
“He challenged those who disagreed with his statement to come up with the facts and statistics. So, we are officially announcing that we are taking up his challenge and we challenge him to an open debate,” DRT member Alim Mideh said at a press conference.
He added that Talib had 14 days to accept the challenge.
“Now that we have taken up his challenge, we will meet him or his team to discuss where and when the debate is to be held, the crowd composition, the format for the debate and other matters of interest.
Asked if DRT had the statistics and facts to be produced to the minister, Alim said that they did have the data.
“But we are not going to hand it over to him just like that because if we do, it will most probably be swept under the carpet. So we would rather give it during an open ‘live’ debate,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Sri Aman DAP is also challenging Talib’s assertion that promotions in the civil service are based on meritocracy.
The branch said it was not possible to come up with the ‘facts and figures’ when all human resource records in the civil service are classified as restricted and confidential documents.
