AGO caught NEA sleeping on the job

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AGO caught NEA sleeping on the job

July 25th, 2014 | Author: Editorial


The Auditor-General’s Office (AGO) released the Auditor-General’s Report for the Financial Year 2013/14 last week (17 Jul).


This year’s report which was submitted by Auditor-General Willie Tan Yoke Meng to President Tony Tan on 1 Jul and presented to Parliament on (15 Jul), highlighted lapses in the administration of grants, schemes and programmes, as well as instances of weak management of resources which resulted in wastage.


Among the ministries and statutory boards cited were the Ministry of Defence, Central Provident Fund Board, National Library Board, Media Development Agency, National Parks Board and National Environment Agency.

In the case of National Environment Agency (NEA), AGO caught NEA officials not doing their jobs properly.


NEA is supposed to conduct inspections on stallholders to ensure that they comply with NEA’s tenancy conditions for the subsidized hawker stalls.


In particular, stallholders of subsidised stalls are required to attend to their stalls personally and are not allowed to sublet them to others.


But in reality, certain number of subsidized stallholders do secretly sublet their stalls out to make money from rentals.


Following complaints received, AGO decided to check on NEA’s inspections. AGO carried out test checks on NEA’s inspections of subsidized hawker stalls and found that NEA has been lax in doing its job. It found inadequate follow-up by NEA officials with stallholders who might have breached tenancy conditions.


From Jan to Mar last year, NEA’s inspection records for 1,016 subsidized stalls showed that 235 (23.1%) of the stalls did not have the stallholders themselves manning the stalls or were closed, during NEA’s consecutive inspections.


AGO found the following inadequacies in NEA’s checks and follow-ups:

• NEA did not take adequate follow-ups on 142 of the 235 stalls and in 23 of these 142 cases, the stalls had remained closed or the stallholders were absent during 9 consecutive inspections by NEA.
• For the remaining 93 of the 235 stalls which NEA had issued letters to the stallholders asking for explanations, AGO observed that in 60 of the 93 cases, the stallholders continued to be missing during NEA’s subsequent inspections.

“This is an indication that NEA’s follow-up actions were ineffective,” AGO said.

In one hawker centre, AGO even caught NEA not inspecting 8 subsidised stalls for 9 months even though the NEA officials are required to do so every month. It’s not known why these 8 stalls were specially ignored.

Last year Apr, a TRE reader sent in a letter and a photo, highlighting that 2 PRCs were seen running a hawker stall at Toa Payoh Lorong 8 hawker centre. He was wondering how this is possible given that NEA’s rules only allowed Singaporeans and PRs to tender for hawker stalls (‘Foreigners owning hawker stalls?‘).

Furthermore, the reader noted that ST even published a good review (24 Mar 2013) for the stall:
“I was more than happy to chance upon a stall called China Delicious selling the Chinese snacks in Toa Payoh Lorong 8 hawker centre and market recently. Set up by two friendly China nationals from Yantai, a coastal city in Shandong province, the one-year-old stall serves a mean xiao longbao (dumpling).”
The reader said:
I was formerly a hawker myself and under NEA’s rules for tender of hawker stalls, “Tenderer must be an individual Singapore Citizen or Permanent Resident”. If these 2 guys (Ed: TRE saw 2 PRC ladies) belong to the latter category, how did they get to become PRs in the first place? How did they manage to “own” a hawker stall when foreigners are not even allowed to work in such places?…
Should NEA care to investigate, the stall is “China Delicious” at Block 210, #01-29, Toa Payoh Lorong 8 hawker centre and market.
TRE emailed NEA for comments. NEA later replied that the stall licensee is a Singaporean and not any PRCs. The 2 PRCs are hawker assistants engaged by the stallholder.
NEA said, “She (the Singaporean stallholder) had engaged two hawker assistants at her stall.”

In its report, AGO commented, “Continuous closure of stalls or absence of stallholders could be an indication that the stalls have been used for unauthorised purposes such as for storage or subletting to others.”
“It is thus important for NEA to enhance its inspection regime to minimize any abuse of the subsidised hawker stall scheme.”

NEA informed AGO that steps were being taken to review its procedures to ensure that proper follow-up actions would be taken. In addition, it would enhance its computerised system and monitor all follow-up actions.
NEA is currently run by Rear Admiral (NS) Ronnie Tay. He was formerly the the Chief of the Navy before he was appointed CEO of IDA. Last year, he left IDA and joined NEA as its new CEO.


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