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A proposal to introduce a bill to force all IT workers in Malaysia to be certified and registered via a single industry body has sparked agitation in the tech sector.
If the proposed legislation, the Board of Computing Professionals Malaysia Bill 2011 (BCPM), is passed, Malaysia will be the first country with a law which requiring IT professionals to be registered with a board before being allowed to practice.
Under the draft bill any professional registering with the board would have to pass examinations, possess professional experience and pay registration fees.
Those against the law claim that the talent pool may shrink if such stipulations are introduced and fear that the board will have too much control over who can be registered, or certified for lucrative government tenders.
The tech community has released a “Common Voice of ICT Professionals” response to the government proposal, stating that the industry is “alarmed” and “caught most of us off-guard”.
“We have not found any information and substantiation that suggests or concludes that the formation of the Board of Computing Professionals is the right and only answer to amicably resolve all matters that the Government perceive to be issues relating to the ICT profession, if such issues indeed do exist in the first place.”
Also under the draft of the proposed bill, unregistered IT professionals will not be allowed to “practice, carry on business or take up employment which requires him to carry out or perform the services of a Registered Computing Professional”. They are also forbidden from gaining any fees, charges, remuneration or other form of consideration for any professional technology services rendered. ®
COMMENTS
any professional registering with the board ... possess professional experience ... unregistered IT professionals will not be allowed to “practice, carry on business or take up employment which requires him to carry out or perform the services of a Registered Computing Professional.
This is why logic should be left to professionals, public servants have no place in this space.
Worrying.
This is worrying. On first reading, the Bill looks innocuously like it only refers to CNII. However, what's defined as CNII in Malaysia is somewhat vague. Secondly, it would not be beyond the bounds of imagination for a project, however small, to be classed as CNII if that would allow a particular service provider to be excluded in favour of another, especially as the Registration Board's chair is to be subject to ministerial appointment. Despite the section(s) on conflict of interest I can quite easily see a company being deregistered for the duration of a bid process, depending on how many golf club memberships are at the disposal of competing execs.
A couple of comment pieces on CPB:
http://ernamahyuni.com/2011/12/08/killing-techies-the-malaysian-way/
http://ernamahyuni.com/2011/12/09/is-the-cpb-really-only-going-to-apply-to-cnii/
AC, since I'm an ex-pat IT bod in Malaysia.
I hope this catches on.
It is good enough for trades, doctors, engineers, vets and teachers to be registered to practice. Some paths are granted automatic registration or exemption from further requirements based on the standards of education.
Maybe then we get some Professional behaviour in the IT profession. I meet too many IT people that only have a job because their standard of work would not be tollerated in any other industry.
My current sysadmin is a walking Denial of Service Attack and somehow managed to blag his way into the job with no certified training. Despite demonstrating his incompetance several times during his probation the firm kept him on. (He must have naked pics of the MD or something.) If the firm's insurance company was to turn around an treat that as the risk that it is, a non registered Syadmin would not be worth the increase in premiums.
Registration won't make a person a good practitioner, but the best ones will be registered.
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