Ashraf Abdel-Wahab* explains why people tend to relate access to government jobs with nepotism Contracting is not currently regulated in government. The civil service is governed by Law 47/1978, which was once appropriate for a particular social, economic and political environment. The law, still applied today, defines two modes of employment in government. The first is hiring, which represents the main tool for building the government workforce, while the second is contracting, which serves as a tool for short-term, seasonal employment. At that end of the 1970s, the government was the main employer and it was quite easy to attract good quality graduates. To this day, the hiring process is strictly regulated, starting from the job description, the existence of adequate financial resources, public advertisement and a selection process based solely on academic record. In brief, the process is quite transparent, though not necessarily efficient since no exams are allowed to determine candidates' competencies. On the other hand, contracting has been used to attract candidates whose responsibilities are limited to a very narrow set of tasks, without the need to endure the hassle of the hiring process. Starting from the mid-1980s, Egypt started a vast programme for economic reform, which focussed on supporting the establishment of a private sector to create jobs and lead economic development. New capacities and economic expertise were required to cope with evolving local regulations, international agreements and treaties, and to improve the government's performance. These changes meant that the private sector gradually became a key job market player, offering new attractive salary scales and work environments. It became much harder for the government to acquire the required capacities given its comparatively low salary scale. Contracting thus became a tool for long-term, highly paid employment in government. Because it is easy to implement, this system may have tempted some officials to hire relatives or friends based on personal interests rather than merit. In turn, a generalised mistrust in government employment started to develop, as de facto corruption became more widespread. The new, proposed Civil Service Law defines different types of employment but also sets out a clear, transparent implementation process. The draft law has yet to be discussed by parliament in the next round, and will not come into effect before 2011. Meanwhile, in a bid to clear the prevalent atmosphere of mistrust, Minister of State for Administrative Development Ahmed Darwish issued Decree 7/2010, rendering the contracting process more transparent. The decree achieves this transparency because it defines each job's terms of reference, requests that all new jobs are published over the Internet and publishes the names of successful candidates. To cope with this regulation, the Ministry of State for Administrative Development has set the jobs portal in motion through the government portal starting March 2010. In its first phase, the jobs portal focussed on publishing content. The portal is being developed to become the government's key employment portal, by incorporating other jobs available through the Ministry of Manpower, thereby including private sector jobs and international agreements. It will also make available other options such as matchmaking, help with CV writing and so on. Building trust in government is a tough task, but we need to change the old vision about the way the government manages our resources and delivers services to citizens. Transparency is, after all, a cornerstone of good governance. * The writer is deputy to the minister of state for administrative development.
