All civil servants should be people of trust

It’s a tale as old as time. The government changes, heads roll, new faces are brought in, half the civil service is grinning and the other half is as glum as grumpy Cat.

The new people stride in, making their presence felt, some a bit more cocky than others. But inevitably, what it boils down to is that really, you are still a civil servant, a cog in the wheel of government bureaucracy, whose desk job is paid for and financed by people like me, through our taxes. Here I am, see me? Waving my hand from the back of the long, winding queue in some obscure governmental department where I’ve come to collect a much-needed form or document, without which I simply cannot proceed in whatever I need to do.

To most of us, the public who rely on the civil service, it really does not matter all that much that you are pissed off as hell that “your” government is no longer in power. Nor are we that impressed (seriously, we aren’t) if “your” government is now calling the shots. We just want to get our slip of paper and head back home through the maddening traffic and road diversions which these days are starting to resemble something out of Raiders of the Lost Ark complete with obstacle courses and meandering detours. 

This is not to say that dealing with a government department always has to lead to despair and the tearing of hair by the fistfuls. Just last week I was so efficiently and politely served at the Identity Card office ten minutes before they closed that I felt compelled to post about it on FB. The very fact that I couldn’t shake off my astonishment is telling in itself; it’s proof if any were needed of just how rare it is to be dealt with professionally by those who we all affectionately refer to as “nies mal-gvern” (people who work with the government). 

A true civil servant should leave his party flag at home and just get on with the job, for the good of the whole country.

In too many cases, you are met with a beady glance and a snarl and you just know this person is very, very unhappy with his/her job and is going to take every little grievance and resentment out on you.  I can understand if the employee has a bad toothache and is miserable, but when the cause of his/her disgruntlement with the world in general is due to fact that “the others” (dawk, they spit the word out scathingly) are in power, then I cease to be so understanding. Three more years in a perpetually bad mood is quite a long time.

All this came to mind on reading an interview with the Head of the Civil Service Mario Cutajar who quite bluntly stated that “people of trust are necessary, especially after spending 25 years in Opposition. Governments need people of trust. This has always been the case and will continue to be so.”

It is a bleak admission of what we know to be Malta’s status quo: staunch supporters of both parties have been known to dig their heels in and refuse to co-operate when the administration changes. Supporters also demand and expect payback for voting a party into power (and when Alfred Sant tried to do it his way without making a clean sweep through government offices, he was crucified by Labour supporters who howled in protest).

It is a bleak admission of what we know to be Malta’s status quo: staunch supporters of both parties have been known to dig their heels in and refuse to co-operate when the administration changes.

When Labour came into power this time, plum jobs, promotions and cushy appointments were handed out like candy on Halloween to anyone “labelled” PL. This was, apparently, in retribution for all those years when anyone getting a top job or post was a PN supporter. (Of course, in some cases, the same savvy voters always manage to ingratiate themselves just in time with one side or the other, according to the way the wind is blowing, in order to get a slice of the pie.) In fact, this situation has led the Ombudsman to recommend that appointments of trust should be limited to the Ministers’ private secretariats.

As for those who vote AD or who do not have a strong affiliation with any particular party, they make their own way the best they can, unwilling to use the pulling of political strings to get ahead.

It is a tiring, depressing game of musical chairs which most people accept as inevitable in a small country where political allegiance infiltrates every crook and cranny of our lives. There are too few good jobs to go round for too many ambitious people, and because power is everything, getting a “government job” close to the seat of power is considered as having hit the jackpot. But to us, the taxpayer, the consumer, the public which is supposed to be “served” by the civil service, all this is mere noise. 

Ideally, everyone in the civil service should be a person of trust. Because a true civil servant should know that his loyalty is to the government of the day (irrespective of who is in power) and should give his day’s work with pride and a sense of satisfaction because, hey, that’s what he is being paid to do. He should leave his party flag at home and just get on with the job, for the good of the whole country.