PEMANDU must declare if the crime statistics has been “audited”, “verified” and “confirmed” by Pricewaterhouse Coopers

PEMANDU has in its Annual Reports and public presentations has repeatedly emphasized that all data and statistics cited by PEMANDU have been “audited”, “verified” and “confirmed” by an independent external auditor to emphasize the accuracy and validity of the numbers presented.

As reported in the 2011 Government Transformation Programme (GTP) Annual Report produced by PEMANDU,

PricewaterhouseCoopers Malaysia (PwC), was engaged in early 2010 and subsequently in 2011 to … validate that the information and data inputs used in determining selected reported NKPIs were in agreement with the information provided by participating ministries, agencies or departments. The respective NKPI calculations were also checked against the guidelines and formulae prescribed by PEMANDU.

The Report went on to claim that “the audit report or more precisely the Agreed upon Procedures (AUP) exercise undertaken by PwC, the GTP’s data has been verified and confirmed.”

Therefore it has come as a complete shock that there are allegations by a former police officer that the data for crime statistics have been systematically manipulated to present the extraordinary success of the police force in reducing crime rates in the country. The GTP Annual Report 2011 boasted that street crimes have been reduced by a “phenomenal” 39.7% while the overall crime index has also fallen by a very commendable 11.1%.

According to the letter written by the anonymous officer, crime cases were being methodically shifted into “non-index” offences that were not registered as part of official statistics presented by efficiency unit PEMANDU.

Index crime is defined as crime which is reported with sufficient regularity and with sufficient significance to be meaningful as an index to the crime situation”. “Non-index crime”, on the other hand, is considered as cases minor in nature and does not occur with such rampancy to warrant its inclusion into the crime statistics or as a benchmark to determine the crime situation.

The writer of the letter gave very detailed and specific examples of how the crime index was manipulated:

• Robbery cases under the Penal Code are classified as index crime. This offence will be re-classified as non-index under Section 382 of the Penal Code. Since, Section 382 of the Penal Code is a non-index crime, therefore will not be reflected in the crime statistics.

• Burglary under Section 457 of the Penal Code is an index crime. This offence will be re-classified as non-index under Sections 452 or 453 of the Penal Code. Since, Sections 452 and 453 of the Penal Code are non-index crime therefore will not be reflected in the crime statistics.

• Causing hurt under Sections 324 and 326 are index crimes. These offences will be re-classified under Section 148 of the Penal Code. Since, Section 148 of the Penal Code is a non-index crime therefore will not be reflected in the crime statistics.

Hence if the allegations are true, and given complete lack of denial by the Royal Malaysian Police, PEMANDU, the Home Minister Datuk Seri Hishamuddin Hussein and the Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak after nearly a week the letter was published, Malaysians cannot but conclude that the glamourous crime statistical achievements published by PEMANDU is nothing by a complete scam.

We would further like PEMANDU, or if they so wish, PwC to confirm if the latter has indeed verified the accuracy and validity of the crime statistics presented by the Royal Malaysian Police to ensure that they have not been manipulated to present artificial achievements.

If no due diligence has been done by PEMANDU or PwC on these data, then PEMANDU is guilty of by publishing inaccurate and inflated the Government’s crime fighting achievements as having been “audited”, “verified”, “authenticated” and “confirmed” by an international auditing firm.

That will be the greatest irony, for PEMANDU is committing the crime of misrepresentation and data fraud, specifically to cover up incidences of crime in Malaysia.