UNIVERSITI TEKNOLOGI MARA (UiTM) SARAWAK

CAMPUS SAMARAHAN

FACULTY OF ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCE AND POLICY STUDIES

BACHELOR OF ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCE (AM228)

ADS452 - ETHICS IN ADMINISTRATION

TITLE: INTEGRITY SYSTEM

QAMA 5

Prepared by:

FLORENCE ANAK WILSON 2020838654

PUTERI RABI‘ATUL’ADAWIYAH BINTI ROSLAN 2020220614
SONIA ANAK TANGGAL 2020640708

Prepared for:
DR. NADRAWINA BT ISNIN

Date of Submission:
11th JULY 2021
 TABLE OF CONTENT

CONTENT PAGES

1.0 Ethical Related Incident Reported in the News 1-2

2.0 Main Issue and a Possible Related Issue

2.1 Main Issue 3

2.2 Possible Related Issue 3-5

3.0 Implications from the Incident

3.1 Disciplinary Action 6

3.2 Affect to Organizational Image 7

3.3 Increase in Crime 8

3.4 Affect the Development of Economic Growth 9

4.0 Conclusion 10

5.0 References 11 - 12
1.0 ETHICAL RELATED INCIDENT REPORTED IN THE NEWS

Ethics is a word that comes from a Greek word, “ethos” which mean character

while morality comes from Latin words, “mores” which is customs. It is a moral

principle where people decide how to lead their lives and get their ethical beliefs from

their religion. According to Barbara MacKinnon, (2012) ethics is a highly personal

thing and is also a set of social principles, the codes of one’s society or particular

groups within it, such as medical or legal organization. Ethics is a system of accepted

beliefs that control behaviour, especially such a system based on morals (Cambridge

dictionary).

Ethics have covered many dilemmas. For instance, how people should live a good

life and what is people rights and responsibilities. It also covers the language that we

use in daily life. Is the language is right or wrong? The dilemmas also include a moral

decision such as what is a good and bad decision to make. Religions, philosophies, and

cultures have all influenced our understanding of ethics.

In addition, they are several principles of ethic in public service which are

selflessness where public servant should act according to the public interest and not

private interest. Integrity where they need to use the highest standard of professional

ethics. Objectivity where public servants should act impartiality and not discriminate

against people. Accountability where the public servant should hold responsible for

their action and decision. Openness when deciding, distribute resources or disclose

confidential information and honesty to the public, so the public has trusted the

government. Public servant should show their leadership and be role models and they

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should respect the person, know when they should listen and respond to them. The

public servant needs to obey the law they should not abuse their power and authority.

One ethical related incident that has been reported in the news that we choose is

bribery. Noonan 1984, Pritchard 199, Green 2006 define bribery as a quintessential

form of corruption. Bribery can be defined as providing, giving, receiving, or soliciting

something of value in order to sway the behaviour of a public official or another person

in control of legal or public duty (Black's Law Dictionary). However, the Malaysian

Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) stated that they define the word bribe as a

gratification where it includes both monetary and nonmonetary bribes.

Under the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission Act 2009 there is Malaysian

Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) under their jurisdiction to investigate and

prevent any abuse of power or corruption among public or private services under

Section 16 and 17A. To fulfil the international requirements under Article 26 of the

United Nations Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC), they enforce Section 17A of

the MACC Act which refers to the liability of legal persons. Before, MACC only

focuses on the individual that doing corruption, but now, Section 17A will enable the

organization that also involve in it to receive legal punishment.

In general, a person who is involved in bribery will be imprisoned maximum 20

years and a minimum fine of RM 10,000 or a five-time value of the bribe or whichever

is higher. We know that a monetary bribe is in a form of cash or cheque, but a

nonmonetary bribe is including job positions, discount offers or vouchers, services,

kinds of gifts such as watches and others.

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2.0 MAIN ISSUE AND A POSSIBLE RELATED ISSUE

2.1. MAIN ISSUE

According to the news article that we choose, it is seen that the main issue

is bribery. Corporal Sazali Hashim was 58 years old when he was sentenced to

16-years of prison and also RM20,000 fine by the High Court. Sazali was a

policeman in Langkawi who was involved in bribery on 18 October 2012 which

was 6 years before. This crime take place when he was on duty at the Jalan Batu

Asah roadblock around 11 am until 12 pm. In that incident, Sazali receive RM

150 bribe from Mohd Asri which was found driving under the influence of

ketum water at that time. The bribe was given to Sazali so that he does arrest

him for his illegal activities and to return the identification card. This incident

confirms the definition of bribery where Mohd Asri give money to Sazali to

change Sazali’s mind not to take legal action against him.

2.2. POSSIBLE RELATED ISSUE

From this case besides bribery, the other related issue is the abuse of

power among civil servants. Abuse means an act of doing something which is

wrong and usually the act disobey the law. According to a source from

Wikipedia, abuse of power happens when the person that has been given

authority misuse their power by doing an unlawful act in order to gain benefits

for themselves. From the news article that we choose, Sazali had done the abuse

their power in conducting his duty. He, as a police officer had given the

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authority to enforce the law which means he must take action against those who

did not follow the law without considering who that person was. As we could

see in that news article, he had abused his power when he used his position and

the power that he had to solicit other people. He was the one that proposes to

Mohd Asri to give him some money so that he can just let him go. Abuse of

power, especially among the civil servant, was a serious matter as they are the

ones that should become the role model to the community. Recently, the case of

the abuse of power among civil servants is not rare anymore. As a result of this

issue, it will cause disrespect of the community to the civil servant.

Bribery and abuse of power is an example of an offence that was done by

the person due to their lack of integrity. Another related issue for the news

article is the breach of trust. In general, breach of trust means the action of fail

to discharge the duty which was given to them when they are entrusted by

another person to do so. According to an article published by Kingsley Napley,

there are four types of breaches of trust. The first type is the transfer of assets

that do not belong to them. The second type is investing the assets which were

trusted to them for their benefits. The third type of breach of trust is the offence

of the fiduciary duty and the last type is the breach of law related to their duty.

Based on Sazali’s case, he had done the breach of trust. As a police officer,

Sazali was entrusted by the government to enforce the law as he had been given

the authority to do so. Next, his superior had trusted him by letting him on duty

for the inspection during the roadblock in Jalan Batu Asah on October 18, 2012.

However, due to his personal benefit, Sazali had failed to do his duty as

entrusted because he chooses to involve with bribery and also soliciting.

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 The next possible related issue in the case of Sazali is a forgery. Black

Latter Law had defined forgery as falsing the document to cheat people. Forgery

usually a crime done by the white-collar officer when they are altering the

information of the legal documents, objects or statistics that can deceive other

people. There is no specific act regarding forgery in Malaysia. However,

according to Zhang (2012), forgery can become a platform for other crimes such

as fraud and deceiving. Falsification of the document was written in Section

477A of the Penal Code. According to this code, there is two offence involve

which is the falsification of the accounts and making a false entry or making

alteration on any data entry. The provision in this section 477A Penal Code

about forgery was then falling under section 89 of the Anti-Money Laundering

and Anti-Terrorism Act 2001. In this section, the guilty person can be fined not

exceeding one million ringgit, or prison not more than one year or both. Based

on Sazali’s case, he is exposed or has the possibility of doing Forgery. This is

because when he receives the bribe, there is a possibility for him to erase or alter

the report in the roadblock to save the guilty person from being arrested or being

sue.

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3.0 IMPLICATIONS FROM THE INCIDENT

3.1. DISCIPLINARY ACTION

The first implication from the incident is disciplinary action will be taken.

For our information, disciplinary action can be defined as a method which deals

with an employee who makes problems in an organization. In another word, it

can be defined as an employee who does not follow or obey the organization’s

rules. It also can be either verbal or written warning. Disciplinary action will be

taken against the individual if they are being caught getting involved in bribery.

It brings a negative impact to them because an employee who gets involved in

bribery will lose their job. For example, in the General Order of State

Government, it is stated in Part IV (Discipline and Disciplinary Procedure),

Article 11, Clause 2 that the public servant who is throughout the process of any

disciplinary action may be suspended or detained from performing their public

duties or official duties.

Other than losing their job, they will also be prosecuted, jailed and fined.

Once they have been taken into disciplinary action, they might have been

blacklisted in order to find another job. This is because they have a disciplinary

record for their past. Even though they have repented, the public will still lack

trust in them. As a result, this will make them experience stress, embarrassment,

sensitivity, freedom of the defendant and limited social interaction. Therefore,

disciplinary action will bring a negative impact to the individual as they might

not get a job once they were getting involved in bribery.

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3.2. AFFECT TO ORGANIZATIONAL IMAGE

The second implication from the incident is the organizational image will

be affected. According to the SAGE Encyclopedia of Industrial and

Organizational Psychology, the organizational image refers to people's

impressions of the organization. In another word, it also can be defined as the

stakeholders or corporate audiences impressions, knowledge or belief in an

organization (Lievens, 2017).

As we all know, when bribery happens in one of the organizations, the

image of the organization can be tarnished. This is because there is a culture of

bribery practised by the employees in the organization. For example, there are

some public servants from one department who were involved in the bribery,

and they have been caught. This case was published in the news. As a result,

people will know about the bribery cases that have happened in the

organization.

Thus, the investors and the stakeholders will lose confidence in the

organization. This will give a negative impact on the organization because if

these bribery cases involve a construction project, the project maybe cannot be

implemented properly. As we can see here, this will lead to a huge loss to the

organization. In the future, if the organization has several large projects to be

implemented, most likely there are neither investors nor stakeholders involved

in the project as they know the organization has had bribery cases before.

Therefore, the organizational image will be affected when some of the

employees get involved in bribery.

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3.3. INCREASE IN CRIME

The third implication from the incident is an increase in crime. Crime can

be defined as an illegal act that is taken by the government to give punishment

to someone. It is one of the acts that are harmful not only to individuals but also

to the community, society and the country. For our information, an increase in

crime will bring a negative impact to the country. This is because every country

has its laws. The laws were created to protect the people from crime as well as

to give punishment to the criminals. If the officer entrusted to enforce the law

does not carry out his responsibilities and is willing to accept bribes, then the

criminals will get away with it as there is no legal action to be taken. This

situation in turn will further encourage them to commit crimes because they

know how to escape.

As a result, the number of criminal cases will increase. For example,

fights which is involving bribery will lead to the occurrence of murder cases

whereby killing people is one of the violent criminal cases. So, if there is an

officer who was given the responsibility to enforce the law, the government

must make sure they carry out their responsibilities to avoid bribery from

happening among the public servants. This is because accepting or giving bribes

will cause an increase in crime. Hence, this will have a negative impact on the

country.

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3.4. AFFECT THE DEVELOPMENT OF ECONOMIC GROWTH

The last implication from the incident is the development of economic

growth will be affected. Economic growth refers to the increase or improvement

in the production of goods and services in terms of economy. As we all know,

bribery will have a negative impact on the development of economic growth.

This is because the cost of undertaking development projects such as schools

and roads will become expensive as the cost of bribery has to be taken into

account in the implementation of such projects. The government had to cancel

or postpone certain projects due to lack of financial resources to fund the

project. For instance, the development project for school is expected to be

completed this year based on allocation provided by the government. However,

due to the irresponsible attitude of some public servants who are willing to

accept bribes, the completion period for the project will be postponed to next

year.

Besides, the price of goods also becomes more expensive as all the bribery

costs have been included in the financing or capital of the business. Plus, the

freedom that arises from bribery will encourage greedy entrepreneurs to

increase their profit margins by neglecting quality and raising the price. As a

result, this will give a direct consequence to the user as the economic burden

arising from the symptoms of bribery falls on the shoulders of society.

Therefore, this can show that any incident of bribery can lead to the

development of the country’s economic growth becoming unstable.

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4.0 CONCLUSION

As a conclusion, bribery is a moral issue that give negative impact especially for

the person, his or her family and also the community. Bribery is also a silent killer for

every civil servant credibility. Many people did not trust public servant because of the

corruption often involves them so this situation will damage the government reputation.

Government has implemented various way to prevent corruption, especially

bribery. National Integrity System is a guiding framework book which ensure

accountability and promote ethical conduct among public or private sector. The

government create a national integrity system to create trust among citizens because

they served by the civil or private servants in the organization.

In addition, the government lunch the National Integrity Plan in 1993, with the

formulation of Public Officers (Conduct and Discipline) where they purpose to set up

an integrity unit at every public agency to monitor and prevent corruption and also to

coordinate integrity efforts. The public or private organization should oblige their

employee to do a corruption-free pledge. With the pledge, they will feel responsible to

uphold integrity, transparency, accountability when exercising their duty wherever they

go.

Without a doubt, fighting corruption is not just a government effort, but all

employees, communities, families, and friends must work together to fight crime that is

spreading today because it impacts all groups in society.

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