Civil servants are most frontline agent of transformation - Najib

As such, the Prime Minister said civil servants should continue striving to ensure that the transformation process would run smoothly to turn Malaysia into a fully-developed and high income nation by 2020.

"The challenge for civil servants is huge and they constantly become the people's focus of attention in ensuring that all the government's policies are being implemented in the best possible manner," he said at the Congress of Unions of Employees in the Public and Civil Services' (Cuepacs) Labour Day celebration here today.

His speech text was read by Federal Territories Minister Datuk Seri Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor.

Najib said civil servant should also be grateful because even during the global economic uncertainties, the government was still able to continue the perks and benefit accorded to civil servants without any salary deduction.

"This shows that the government has always protected the interests of civil servants and is concerned about their wellbeing," he said.

Najib said the welfare and wellbeing of 1.6 million civil servants in the country would remain a priority to the government.

In fact, he said in the 2016 Budget, various allocations were given to matters related to civil servants, including a special aid of RM500; salary increment on July 1; minimum wage of RM1200; minimum pension of RM950; and increase in individual tax relief.

"These allocations have benefited 1.6 million civil servants and they all came from a government which has always put the interests of the people first," he said.

Meanwhile, in a bid to ensure that civil servants would be able to own their dream house, Najib, who is also Finance Minister, said the government had allocated RM1.6 billion to the 1Malaysia People Housing Project (PR1MA) to build 175,000 houses which to be sold at a price 20 percent lower than the market price.

Besides, the prime minister said the government had allocated RM200 million to Syarikat Perumahan Negara Berhad (SPNB) to build 20,000 people-friendly homes with a subsidy of RM20,000 per unit and another RM200 million allocation for the first home deposit funding scheme.