SENATE Youth and Sports Minister Khairy Jamaluddin suggested today the setting up of a high-level financial management committee chaired by the minister to monitor the ministry's financial transactions and that of its agencies.

Khairy told the Dewan Negara this was to improve the existing financial procedure, whereby tighter monitoring could be done by the minister himself with the assistance of the ministry's senior officials to prevent leakage, abuse of power and misappropriation.

"I suggest that a high-level financial management committee be established at my ministry first and to be chaired by the minister himself. This has never happened before because all this while, when it came to financial matters, the minister would ask the secretary-general and he would answer. That's all.

"But there is no permanent committee chaired by the minister himself to do continuous monitoring of the expenditure and all financial transactions of the ministry."

'Panel should meet twice a year'

Khairy said this in reply to a question from Senator Shahanim Mohamad Yusoff with regard to on-going procedural and financial process weaknesses at the ministerial level, to the extent of causing leakage, power abuse and embezzlement, like the case involving a senior official of the Youth and Sports Ministry.

Khairy said the high-level committee should meet at least twice a year and report in detail all financial transactions, and not just orally.

He said the existing financial procedure gave limited power to the ministry's financial controller in making decisions, while the minister had no absolute power over the decisions.

"There needs to be change at every ministry as the current procedure provides opportunities for misappropriation by senior officials and it has already happened," he said.

The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission had in March detained a senior official of the Youth and Sports Ministry for suspected misappropriation of government funds amounting to RM107 million.

- Bernama