Councillors' Roles

I was invited to present a paper entitled The Roles, Functions and Responsibilities of the Councillors in Local Authority in Applying the Local Agenda 21 Effectively yesterday morning. The Workshop was organised by the Women Local Councillors Association of Malaysia (WLA). 2 interesting observation attracted my attention, these include 100% of participants are women from the whole country and their reaction over some remarks I made. I was there alone for one and half hour talking to about 150 ladies and no man is inside the hall. Talking to them at the initial stage requested me to make few adjustment. Firstly on addressing them as "Ladies" rather than the usual "Ladies and Gentlemen". Secondly on emphasizing the need for women participation in Local Agenda 21. Thirdly, things that women can do and able to do but obviously has not done enough yet.

I spoke about the role of councillors as decision maker for policies enactment and budgetary planning as well as shaping the urbanscape and form of our city. I challenged them of not visiting the drains so frequently with reason that it is the job of the paid officers. Their role is actually to supervise and monitor the performance of the officers. It is their prerogative to overseeing the policies and programmes as planned and approved have been carried out in proper manner.

Presently Councillors have been judged based on their presence in the news and locality. They are perceived of doing their duties diligently if reports on the news said so or the feedback from residents group said so. These are normally in the form of their visit to look at the drains, children playground, street lighting, traffic light, pothole or attending to the functions of the local group. Many do not bother about what Councillors have commended about policies at the Federal or State level or ideas about turning the city into a liveable one. People are prioritising the personal relationship over other performances.

To some, it is nothing wrong and rightly so. To me, it is nothing wrong as well but I personally think that these can be minimised and let them monitor the performance of the Council Staff and help to shape our cityscape.