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Essay / Corporate Governance in Malaysia
Corporate governance has come under scrutiny, especially since the bankruptcy of major companies such as Maxwell, Polly Peck and Enron, etc. Many principles and thoughts emerged, all pointing towards strong performance in certain areas such as governance measures and procedures. Although it is not easy to link a company's performance to its governance measures, there is a strong belief that good governance practices could lead to better company performance (Young , 2003). Therefore, several studies have endeavored to offer experiential suggestions on this issue through several methods, for example by developing the governance index and relating it to performance (Klapper and Love, 2004), focusing on the study of events (Baliga, Moyer and Rao, 1996, Rosenstein). and Wyatt, 1990) further studying a relationship between positive governance practices and firm performance (Van Ees, Postma and Sterken, 2003), Kiel and Nicholson, 2003), Coles, McWilliams and Sen, (2001 ), Laing and Weir (1999), Dalton, Daily, Ellstrand and Johnson (1998), Barnhart and Rosenstein (1998), and Agrawal and Knoeber, 1996). Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why violent video games should not be banned”?Get the original essayCorporate governance has attracted great attention from academics, watchdogs and general practitioners due to the general belief according to which corporate governance increases the will and confidence of shareholders, also improves the economics of companies Coleman, (2006) and Garg, (2007). Furthermore, corporate governance mechanisms have been put forward to affect firm performance (Chuanrommanee and Swierczek, 2007) and contribute to the integrity of the financial reporting process in different organizational contexts (Petra, 2007). This is just as important for private listed companies as it is for public listed companies. Thus, as the primary mechanism of corporate governance, the board of directors has a fiduciary responsibility to monitor management against opportunistic behavior. However, the extent to which corporate governance in general and board governance in particular protects shareholders depends on the effectiveness of the mechanisms. In this regard, numerous corporate governance recommendations and guidelines have been issued to ensure that the board of directors discharges its functions effectively. Malaysia, as an emerging market, issued its own corporate governance code in 2000, which was revised in 2007 and should be followed by all. listed companies. Nevertheless, Malaysian listed companies have faced criticism regarding their role and performance in the Malaysian economy and have recently come under increased scrutiny by the government (Abdul-Aziz et al., 2007 ). The reason is that GLCs have suffered from recurring poor financial performance. Muslim Har et al., (2012). Thus, the Malaysian government, as a major shareholder of state-linked listed companies, has embarked on a new transformation policy aimed at strengthening the governance system of its listed companies. The underlying principles of the policy are national development, emphasis on performance and good governance, as outlined by the Putrajaya Governance Committee (PGC). One of the important objectives of the policy is to improve the effectiveness of corporate governance of GLCs through the improvement of certain board mechanisms which are expected to impact the..