What is the Jana Wibawa Programme?

Jana Wibawa, or Program Jana Ekonomi Pemerkasaan Kontraktor Bumiputera (Bumiputera Contractor Empowerment Economic Generation Programme), was introduced in November 2020 during Muhyiddin Yassin’s administration. (This article is largely from Malaysiakini published on 22 February 2023). 

In a parliamentary reply on Dec 16, 2021, then-finance minister Tengku Zafrul Abdul Aziz laid out two purposes for the programme. The first was to expedite the delivery of government projects to help stimulate Malaysia’s post-Covid-19 economic recovery. The second was to help bumiputera contractors in the construction industry build capacity to become more competitive.

Source:https://www.therakyatpost.com

Projects under Jana Wibawa were awarded either through direct negotiation or prequalified tenders. Pre-qualified tenders involve only contractors who passed a pre-qualification process and are invited to submit their bids for a project.

With direct negotiation, there is no tender process at all. Projects are awarded to a contractor after negotiations with the government. Nevertheless, Zafrul assured at the time that there were safeguards in place.

According to Zafrul in the same written reply, a special evaluation committee at the Finance Ministry would vet the contractors and the conditions imposed on them. He said the committee comprises representatives from the Public Works Department, Irrigation and Drainage Department and the Construction Industry Development Board.

In addition, the implementation of Jana Wibawa projects must follow Treasury Department guidelines regarding directly negotiated contracts and the terms of reference for the Jana Wibawa programme.

The Treasury guidelines stipulate the circumstances where directly negotiated contracts may be considered and the document is publicly available. However, little is publicly known about Jana Wibawa’s terms of reference. 

In a parliamentary written reply on Feb 20, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Law and Institutional Reform) said letters of acceptance were issued for 56 projects valued at RM6.3 billion. The MACC is investigating cases where the letters “involved family members of main leaders in certain political parties”.

A source at the MACC told Malaysiakini that Bersatu received contributions believed to be more than RM300 million from around 10 contractors who were awarded various projects when the party was running the government. The agency  supposedly froze Bersatu’s bank accounts in mid-January to facilitate investigations into this matter.

People who championed integrity are now tainted by allegations of bribery. A former PM who called himself “Abah” was behind the Jana Wibawa scheme. Why is integrity sacrificed in politics?

Reference:

What is the Jana Wibawa programme? Koh Jun Lin, Malaysiakini, 22 Feb 2023