A reply to The Star's article on "Academia call-up for ex-top guns" (Published in The Star 12/8/2006)

Academia call-up for ex-top guns

As a scholar and teacher, I strongly support the content of the above headlines published by The Star on the 11th August 2006. I can draw from my own experience as a lecturer in the UK that increased collaboration between universities and industries can be beneficial in many ways. Some of the main benefits for students include relevance of theories through practical examples, knowledge of industry issues, industrial placement and job opportunities; and for academics, the benefits include potential funding opportunities, research access and relevance of research for practitioners. While most universities in the UK actively seek collaboration with managers in the industry, the process tends to be selective and formal in terms of ensuring that there are mutual benefits for the university, industry and students. In brief, this process operates under the Knowledge Transfer Partnerships (KTP) scheme, with the main priority on knowledge and technology transfer among the aforementioned three parties. But, as far as the idea of recruiting experienced civil servants or managers to lecture university students, this is not a common practice particularly not for top UK universities. From the university’s perspective, the main difficulties of this idea are: (a) whilst practitioners bring with them the wealth of knowledge about hands-on experience, there is a need to blend pedagogical needs with theories and achieve a balance of theoretical insights, application of knowledge and evaluation models for students self-development; (b) practitioners are concerned with current and/or ‘live’ problems whereas academics could be engaged in either application or basic research. This presents two incompatibilities – the first is that most practical problem or solution is context-specific and future graduates need to acquire the ability to bridge this gap of applying conceptual models to a new or different situation. Secondly, theories without substance are also problematic and academics need to engage industry experts for enriching students’ learning experience and for better conceptualisation of real-world dynamics. And (c) the environment is constantly changing, what used to work in practice may not be the case for future graduates (managers) and hands-on solutions need to consistently put to test in empirical research. This could limit the role of industry experts, where there is a need to acquire research skills, and to scientifically measure and generalise real-world phenomenon. Thus, it is not surprising that the British higher education coined the idea of KTP in order to encourage collaboration between universities and industries. I am sure that Datuk Mustapa Mohamed would have considered the above for raising the Higher Education standards and employability of graduates.

Retaining top academics and learning from foreign university systems (Published in the Star 23/9/2006)

Retaining top academics and learning from foreign university systems

I would like to refer to your article entitled ‘Abdullah asks for ideas to check brain drain’ published by The Star on the 23rd September 2006.

I share our PM’s views about seeking feedback from Malaysian students of what they seen and experienced at foreign universities as one of the ways to improve working conditions and retain academics of local universities. As a Malaysian who has studied and been working in the UK, I would like to add to the discussion: the first is that a competitive salary package is a basic necessity for retaining top academics. It is not the most important factor and yet, if such basic needs were not fulfilled, one would find it difficult to focus on higher level needs or simply be contented with one’s expectations. Not to mention, good scholars and/or top academics are people with specialised and rare knowledge, and therefore they are likely to be highly marketable or always in great demand. This leads to my second point that it’s necessary to attract top academics to work in Malaysia both local and foreign academics. Many new or aspiring local academics would be able to learn from experienced teachers and researchers. Malaysian universities must therefore adopt an open door policy for high calibre academics and cultivate a research-oriented environment. This requires change in our higher education policy stance with significant emphasis on research, and investment in human capital and research facilities. The change would affect the way academics work, the structure of a university, and the allocation of government funds. To this effect, research and teaching activities should be monitored and evaluated independently by a panel of top academics. My third and final point is that the effectiveness and relevance of foreign university systems should not be overemphasized. In brief, no one institution is perfect and every environment (country) is different. Malaysia is unique, multicultural and in the vicinity of China and in the region of fastest economic growth. Altogether, they present many potential contributions to academia, and plenty of research avenues for growth and knowledge development, which are ideal for attracting and retaining top academics. In the face rapidly changing environments, we need to be proactive in spotting talents and recognise top researchers’ contribution – as we all know that no amount of learning, training and investment in infrastructure can substitute scholars with vision and leadership.

Reflections on Malaysia’s Economic Progress and Wealth Distribution: Some Key Questions to Policy Makers

Reflections on Malaysia’s Economic Progress and Wealth Distribution: Some Key Questions to Policy Makers


The People have delivered their verdict on the recent Malaysia’s 12th general election and it is time for all bickering about political rhetoric to take a back seat. In the midst of chaotic restructuring and constant backstabbing of politicians, the opposition could loose focus on turning the election manifestos into reality and serving the people.

Economic wellbeing and progress of the nation is one of the main reasons for the people’s dissatisfaction with the ruling government (BN), which transpired to a historic election defeat. In a crude sense, our economic malaise especially economic and wealth distribution is not the sole responsibility of the current PM but has been simmering under the various positive headlines with politically motivated agenda of the previous premier. To the uninitiated, poverty may not be physically visible as one observes our surroundings but when one probes and examines the deeper fabric of socio-economic deprivations and inequalities, the voice of dissatisfaction is loud and clear particularly for those in the lowest income group, where poverty is affecting them in a vicious circle on future generations in terms of education and knowledge, health service and proper nourishment for child development, and economic opportunity. This is even more profound when one removes government subsidies on basic commodities such as oil. The result is disheartening, as the use of subsidies and short-term tax incentives for attracting foreign direct investment to propel domestic economic growth is unsustainable in the long term. There are also greater socio-economic gaps between the working class and the middle class (not to mention the upper class). The indirect effects are marginalisation of certain groups of the population, creating various social problems such as community integration (e.g., recent protests of the Indian community), turning to crimes and vices for living, and downward spiralling standards of living for the majority. So, to our leaders, what measures of economic and wealth distribution are in place to redress this economic imbalance and distribute economic wealth to the lowest population strata of economic wellbeing?

Unfortunately, there is no clear cut solution as economic, health and education policies are intertwined. Within the economic framework, economic and wealth creation and distribution are mainly driven by national economic policy across resource-based industrial and agricultural sectors, e.g., conventional government projects are meant to stimulate job markets, growth, consumer demand etc. from industry to micro-market or consumer level. Setting corruption aside for another discussion, we could start by revisiting past and examining current and future economic policies. In this context, one would need to reflect on some of the following basic economic questions and brief comments whilst policies are being analysed and formulated:
What did we learn from past economic policies?
Over the last two decades, Malaysia’s economic focus in terms of trade and export incomes has tended to shift from agricultural resources to industrialised manufacturing (see: Malaysia’s Industrial Master Plans (IMP). Initially, from the look east policy of attracting foreign direct investment (re:Japan) and MNCs plants locational decision with various tax incentives, though some sceptics would argue that excessive red tapes hampered this effort. Despite some success in attracting major MNCs (Japanese and Western corporations), the economic impetus stopped short of knowledge transfer initiatives and creation of new industries and opportunities. Evidently, the rise of China and India (not to mention competitive neighbouring labour markets in the Far East Asia Region) has caused policy makers to question the role and value of MNCs in job creation, and technology and knowledge transfer. With the exception of Proton (though debatable and its global market position in under threat), there is little evidence of development and accumulation of intellectual assets through concerted and effective past economic policies. The question is how foreign capital inflows, and both direct and indirect investments have resulted in adequate distribution of wealth in terms of knowledge transfer (such as technical knowledge and managerial skills) to blue and white-collar workers.

During the period of economic boom in the mid 1990s, the government have also championed information technology and knowledge based industries such as the creation of MSC. This has been a worthy economic investment, though it had not been carefully planned and implemented. In addition, the timing was wrong in terms of human capital and infrastructure development, e.g., there was no systematic policy in encouraging and developing ICT knowledge at all levels of education. The lack of investment in technology-related and technical knowledge has been a critical shortcoming when potential investors and companies evaluate and make their investment choices, and decisions vis-à-vis other countries. So, what will the government do to nurture and create opportunities for future generations, who are likely to be relying more on knowledge-based industries?

After the Far East Asian economic crisis and various circumstances (September 11, bird flu, tsunami, etc.), one could argue that the government seemed to have lost its economic focus (e.g., incoherent economic direction in the Ninth Malaysia Plan) and hence, the search for new and major infrastructure projects took place, which resulted in the Iskandar Development Region (IDR) project in Johor. Amid growing criticisms of economic stagnation during the period of 2004-2006, the government fumbled and resorted to driving internal economic demands through construction and real estate sectors, agricultural sectors, and extension of the Visit Malaysia Year campaign. The post September 11 event has also facilitated the growth of Middle East investors in real estates and medical care services, and the idea of Islamic Banking hub. The idea of medical tourism was also put forward despite glaring basic health concerns of the national health policy for the people, e.g., the government could do more to educate people about the health risks of smoking. There has also been substantial investment in petrochemical and chemical based products driven by natural resources in the face of increasing world demand of oil and chemical-based products. While these industrial sectors are important to the economy, the government had been reactive or ad hoc (as opposed to proactive) in charting the strategic development of the economy. For example, what resources were allocated to help small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and local businesses in developing skills and knowledge of modern agricultural techniques particularly with regards to previous economic plans? In what ways the current economic emphases are building on previous investments in MSC projects, industrial clusters and knowledge-based industries?

Furthermore, the Iskandar Development Region (IDR) (as much as a welcome boost of capital injection) baffled the geo-economic and strategic logic of effective allocation of scarce resources. Although this can be seen as an attempt to distribute resources to other states in the country, the IDR project is arguably a wrong strategic and investment decision in terms of the following points (which can be discussed further in another article): (a) diseconomies of scale whereby investment in existing industries and infrastructure is counterproductive and non-competitive when the region has little slack resources. (b) When the choice of strategic position (location) may not be advantageous in terms of the presence of existing industries and services to support demand of technical skills, and the labour market is relatively small compared to other states. Also, not to mention there is little consideration of geography and population, and topography of the region, e.g., had the region been prone to flooding? (c) When our neighbour, Singapore has established networks and advanced industries (Gulati et al., 2000). The thought of benefiting from economic spillover effects is also a non-runner – as Singapore focuses on highly technical industries such as financial hub services and international seaport services. (d) When the cost-benefit and opportunity cost analysis had not been carefully examined, e.g., the use of existing strategic/national infrastructure airport, seaport and administration. (e) When human capital development in a progressive manner from existing industrial regions had not been fully capitalised, e.g., there is a steep learning curve in the region that will further curtail skills upgrade in the extant industries. (f) When our economic bi-lateral relationship with Singapore had not been carefully managed, promoted and professionally developed. (g) When previous economic projects had not been integrated or further revised to capitalise on time compression diseconomies as opposed to inefficient allocation of resources. (h) When FDI strategy mainly promises asset appreciation without transfer of technology or knowledge – further questioning the government policy of carefully planned distribution of economic wealth in the long term.

Have ordinary citizens benefited from the period of economic boom or growth from the mid to late 1990s? If not, what went wrong and what lessons can be drawn to prevent such recurrence?
Unfortunately, only a minority of people reaped the rewards of the long gone boom period in the Asia region. Again, most would argue that this is due to deeply entrenched corruption, nepotism and cronyism in awarding projects, siphoning state resources, and misusing funds and abusing of power. I would refrain from the topic of corruption and clean governance to focus on economic and wealth distribution.

In a buoyant economic climate, one would expect the government to reinvest revenue growth and savings, improve national and foreign reserves, upgrade strategic infrastructure, and distribute economic benefits taking a long-term view. To a large extent, these key foundations for improving the standard of living and average national income of the population had not been exploited for the majority of ordinary Malaysians. First, can the government account for specific economic wealth distributed across Malaysian states and communities? If so, who have been the beneficiaries? Have the people who live in villages, small businesses and blue-collar workers benefited? It is true that there have been growth in the construction and property sectors. But they are exclusive to several developers with privilege government approvals. Importantly, real estate development derives from natural resources (lands) and employs foreign cheap labours. There is no creation of sustainable value in terms of human capital development. There are also questions on the effective use of natural resources, quality of developments and sustainability of townships in terms of the effects on the environment. Of particular concern is that the people in low-income groups have been sidelined and they remain impoverished in the share of economic wealth. Second, the government had the opportunity to bolster the country’s national and foreign reserves. Yet, it is questionable that the Bank Negara and policy makers had used domestic and export growth to maintain a healthy currency-money ratio without risky exposure to credit expansion and retirement of bank notes, as evident in capital control measures in the aftermath of Asia financial crises. In addition, the monetary base had not appeared to be in balance, as growth in foreign reserves from trade surplus were not exploited to counter monetary effects and purchase of foreign assets. This could have stabilised our currency and balance trade liabilities but the Malaysian Ringgit depreciated unfavourably. To the laypeople, had the government implemented appropriate fiscal measures, the cost of goods would not be exposed to unhealthy inflationary pressures (e.g., wages had not increased as rapidly as prices of goods) and the people would have a higher purchasing power and hence raise their standard of living. Third, due to haste and poor planning (perhaps also self-interest or personal gains) major infrastructure projects (highways, skyscrapers, airports, etc.) had not been appropriately funded. The treasury could have channelled revenues from major corporations (e.g., tax windfalls) and natural resources (e.g., oil) to finance basic infrastructure such as highways instead of passing on the ever increasing and eternal costs (e.g., toll fees) to the people. Although privatisation of certain national assets may improve service quality, there is lack of competition in government projects as well as complicated bureaucracy serving further barriers for the functioning of perfect markets. Furthermore, some mega projects were excessively expensive (I omitted names) and fully funded by the government, as opposed to funding basic infrastructure for the people especially in the context of a developing country. Most importantly, for the ordinary people, there has been too much window dressing at the national and state level when residential roads and associated public services (from clearance of rubbish to uneven roads with pot holes) remain mostly unattended. Again, most infrastructure development comes at a high price without proper planning, affecting local communities financially, socially and environmentally.

How competitive is our public services and infrastructure in attracting FDI?
The creation and distribution of economic wealth are influenced by the performance of public services, government aids and infrastructure. Substantial inroads have been made to promote efficient and high quality public services to the people as well as potential investors. But much more remains to be done especially public transport services, health care services and local council services. If the public complained about the standard of such services, it would be questionable that the standard is competitive for attracting foreign investors. One instance is the poorly planned LRT system without sensible forethought of current and future requirements, e.g., short platform, limited and/or fixed capacity, flawed urban and traffic reduction strategy. This is clearly hampering the capital’s competitiveness and discouraging the public from using our LRT system in the city. On this note, I strongly advise the present coalition (Pakatan Rakyat) to avoid benchmarking the KL system and carry out its own feasibility study. Not to mention, we have all heard of irresponsible bus companies rendering transportation services. The implications are not only far-reaching in terms of attracting investors and tourists but also dire, as public safety is unduly compromised. Another area where improvement is long overdue is the provision of efficient banking and financial services. Whilst the banking industry has consolidated in recent years, the standard of service particularly to local businesses is variable and inconsistent (if not substandard by international ratings). For example, there is shortage of trained personnel in providing financial advice on both basic and complex financial instruments and customers usually need to queue for hours to be seen. This is counter productive to the economy, which would defeat all the efforts put into attracting foreign businesses. There is a need for more competition, compliance to an acceptable level of service set by financial services authorities and government support in competitive measures. The government have been making many headlines about investment in public services and positive inflows of FDI. But to many observers, there are gaping concerns with the competitiveness of our public services. In a nutshell, the government and relevant authorities need to address and improve public services and implement visible improvements. Obviously, one would argue that there have been improvements but as long as our public services remain below par compared to rival nations, the government have not yet delivered for the people. In the context of economic and wealth distribution to the poor and marginalised, basic amenities and public services are the backbone for facilitating entrepreneurial pursuit – whereby Malaysians can be more progressive and competitive through efficient support of basic public services.

What forms of support and incentives that the government provide for SMEs (if so, have such incentives been accessible to ordinary Malaysians)?
Small and medium-sized businesses are the foundations of thriving local economies and with the right policy the people would not only benefit but also create stability and value in the economy. For example, are there effective measures in improving the agricultural and farming industries in terms of quality and productivity? This could help alleviate shortage of basic commodities such as rice and flour (at least in the short to medium term) and underline domestic economy stability. Malaysia is a fortunate country endowed with the abundance of natural resources, tropical climate suitable for agricultural activities, and surrounded by the ocean with huge potential marine lives export. But years of neglect, lack of strategic vision and under investment meant that the resource-based of a nation’s competitive advantage had been overlooked. Did the government consider the associated opportunity costs when finalising the successive IMP 1, 2 and 3? Even, if there had been investments in the agricultural sectors, they were lacking in economic convictions and competitiveness measures. The federal government have been too preoccupied with industrialisation (see no. 1) and loose sight of the varied nature of economic resources particularly in building on existing resources in the East Malaysia. We could only look back the years of loss opportunity for the people across different states (not necessarily in the capital) to improve their living standard through investment in technology, production techniques, sustainable agricultural activities and business skills for SMEs – benchmark against regional and international standards. The government only recognised this in the Ninth Malaysia Plan and tried to reposition the agricultural and agro-based industry. One could also argue that this is a reactive response, as the country’s reliance on manufacturing competitiveness is dwindling without substantial technical and knowledge transfer strategy in the early years of IMP 1 and 2. In terms of strategic and economic planning, the implications are costly due to scale effects and diseconomies (e.g., playing catch up in the regional market, network barriers, marginal costs) and the Ninth Malaysia Plan can be criticised for the absence of clear strategies to circumvent these negative effects.

Furthermore, piecemeal solutions, sheer planning without strategic vision and poor implementation have negative social and economic implications. For example, what are the complementary economic effects of activities related to industrialisation, agriculture, financial and professional services, tourism, and ICT and knowledge-based services? Evidently, the tourism development (re: the Visit Malaysia Year Campaign) has been poorly coordinated with various substandard ancillary services, e.g., see some of the letters of dissatisfied tourists published in The Star. Many sectors of local businesses are ill prepared and the government campaign falls short of providing relevant aids (e.g., service training, international marketing) to enable small businesses to share the benefit of invisible income from tourism activities. Most critically, the negative word-of-mouth affects future business and competitiveness of this industry – dampening efforts to create economic wealth for many businesses.

In the effort of driving the agricultural industry, there are also underlying social and economic issues mainly due to conflicting resource demands particularly for skilled and trained labour markets. For example, the constant labour/population migration to the capital and industrial states, and perceived economic disincentives in the agriculture-based sectors is creating a myriad of social and cultural problems. There is no clearly visible government action in managing and balancing these demands at the state and national levels through its economic and human resource strategy. This affects the movement of labour and skills development with long-term consequences for the people’s social and economic wellbeing.

What measures have the government put in place to explore and exploit Malaysia’s strategic and cultural position of two major growing economies in Asia, India and China?
Malaysia’s foreign economic policy with regards to India and China remains relatively under tapped from a strategic viewpoint. Despite our geographical proximity, advantage of language and cultural similarity, and established networks with commonwealth countries (serve as potential economic and business conduits), there is no evidence of systematic economic initiatives in helping Malaysian businesses to see the bigger picture of economic rewards and how Malaysia could leverage its economic position. In particular, what did the government do to promote Proton in China and India? This would not be restricted to selling our national cars but extend to the exchange of technology and knowledge development, e.g., in parts and components manufacturing, joint ventures and strategic alliances. In effect, we could create and add value to related local manufacturers and suppliers, and spur domestic economy. As both India and China are experiencing tremendous growth in the motor vehicle industry the government need to be proactive and implement market-driven strategy (Day, 1994) to form business partnerships and attract potential investors. There are also ample business opportunities in other industries such as construction and real estate. What did the government do to help our construction companies to compete with overseas rivals? For example, the Korean construction industry is benefiting from the growth in China with knowledge of relationship development and marketing strategy (Eng and Wong, 2006; Eng and Spickett-Jones, 2007; Eng et al., 2008) despite not having the language advantage. The tourism industry would also benefit from the increasing wealth of these countries. But various government agencies in the tourism sector are lackadaisical, overlooking obvious provision of basic leisure services for these markets, e.g., language assistance at airports and major tourist attractions.

Government policy could help small and medium-sized business entrepreneurs explore and develop their business in China and India. The representatives from the MCA and MIC could support local business entrepreneurs and build economic ties using the advantage of language and culture such as through specific foreign business missions and conventions. There are also benefits for the halal food industry in targeting Muslim population in China. As a nation of multicultural society, this advantage is readily accessible to ordinary Malaysians and can be leveraged through informed business and marketing strategy. Despite our experience from the success of organising the Commonwealth games (albeit in a smaller scale), the government could have been bold and competitive in helping local businesses to bid for potential projects of the Beijing Olympic Games. The rapid pace of growth in China and India also creates opportunities for our petroleum and chemical business in terms of energy consumption of consumers and industrial markets. The focus of government foreign economic policy on these emerging economic powers would generate a far more pronounced economic effect with longer term economic growth compared to investment in other markets.

Clearly, scarce human and economic resources of our country need to be allocated to the most effective use in maximising return-on-investment. The government need to be selective in developing its portfolio of foreign economic ties and strategic in creating economic benefits especially in addressing wealth inequalities. While the Ninth Malaysia Plan noted the importance of moving the economy up the value chain, it is hard to find any specific action plans at local levels, and metrics for performance and control of strategy in the published document. In brief, value creation on the global commodity chain is progressive and highly influenced by marketing skills such as branding (Gereffi, 1999; Humphrey, 2004; Cheng et al., 2005; Eng et al., 2007, 2008). Information technology application alone would not result in higher value-added services but the stock and combination of intellectual and human capital assets as well as knowledge of resource development are essential for successful upgrading on the value creation chain (Helfat and Peteraf, 2003). Furthermore, economic conditions would moderate this economic aspiration, e.g., the scope and intensity of competition could stimulate innovation (Porter, 1980). This depends on the functioning of an efficient market (e.g., transparent and competitive rather than based on quotas) with appropriate mechanisms to deregulate and privatise major industries. A highly bureaucratic business environment would only serve to jeopardise efforts of eradicating economic inequalities in the long-term. This is simply because markets are dynamic (Teece et al., 1997) and at a minimum, protective measures would limit exposure to competitive knowledge.

Is the current economic development parallel with human capital investment and/or education policy? In other words, is the country over relying on both spectrum of the labour market (skilled and unskilled) as well as experiencing high levels of brain drain?
As discussed above (no. 1), the pace of human capital development is lagging behind industrialisation (re: first-class infrastructure third-class mentality quoted in the Ninth Malaysia Plan). The economy is also over-relying on cheap labour and suffering from high levels of brain drain. The implications are not only resulting in the increased of socio-economic inequalities but also negative consequences for knowledge transfer and acquisition at both ends of the labour-market spectrum, i.e., government policy would not be motivated to upgrade foreign-labour skills and knowledge development is transient without continuity at the higher level. Unskilled and poor people would be left in doldrums to fend for themselves whereas the rich entrepreneurs would hit stagnation in terms of business development opportunity (e.g., a typical family business/ownership aspiration).

The government education policy is non-competitive in terms of awarding scholarships and university places. At the very least, this cultivates complacency at all levels of the national education system and at worst, this produces incompetent graduates affecting wellbeing of future generations. Although more Malaysians have obtained tertiary and higher education degrees, foreign multinationals seemed prefer to recruit non-government sponsored graduates or foreign personnel. In a u-turn strategy of sponsoring students abroad, the government encourage Malaysians to study at local universities by setting up many new universities and/or granting university status to many former local colleges. But many Malaysians questioned the standard of our universities against other international institutions (e.g., against Singapore’s universities) especially after our recent poor performance in the world university rankings. Some universities attempted to fix this problem by rotating senior management rather than instigating a systematic investigation to enhance higher education standards. Unsurprisingly, the government admitted to the widening inequality of income in the Ninth Malaysia Plan despite the increased levels of education across the board. If the country’s education standard had not been on par with overseas institutions, the majority of students that graduate from local institutions would be at a disadvantage in competitive job markets. Put simply, for future generations (managers, engineers, doctors etc.) to survive successfully in the changing environment the government should not compromise or cut corners when it comes to investment in education. The people who are most vulnerable or to lose are those in low income groups. It is time for the government to take actions – not be hesitant or intimidated by certain self-interest individuals. Furthermore, academic resources are not strictly immobile and they are tradeable in competitive markets (Black and Boal, 1994).

The above questions are not exhaustive and merely scratching the surface of basic economic issues in the functioning of markets and distribution of economic wealth. The government’s past economic records and current economic policies are in tatters. I urge stronger and more informed opposition from the Pakatan Rakyat, and the current government to listen to the people. One has to examine methodically across industry sectors using relevant indicators and analytical tools for the context of our country. The interrelated nature of policy formulation and decision-making in public sectors means that economic performance is not bound to standard economic measures but include cultural and behavioural phenomenon. To fellow Malaysians, I hope that the extent to which we assess changes and judge the government and the coalition (opposition) would be on tangible outputs rather than policy per se. And to the Malaysian media, I extend my support for greater information and press freedom where reporting would be independent, timely and accurate, so that, the people are informed and empowered to drive democratic changes from the elected and relevant government representatives.

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