With the aim of ensuring efficiency and accountability in the public service sector, Government has announced a series of reassignments of Permanent Secretaries (PS).
This announcement was made by Minister of State Joseph Harmon on Sunday at the closing ceremony of a three-day retreat and workshop for top management employees of Ministries, Agencies and Departments of the Government, held at Splashmins Eco Park. The reassignments will affect the Ministries of Agriculture; Education; Indigenous Peoples’ Affairs; Legal Affairs; Public Health; and the Department of Culture, Youth and Sport.
Harmon, who was particularly disappointed with budgeted spending, said these changes became effective from March 1.
The reassignment is as follows: Joylyn Nestor Burrowes has taken up the post of acting Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA), replacing George Jervis who, along with MoA Deputy Permanent Secretary (Finance) Prema Roopnarine, has been asked to proceed on leave.
Collette Adams will now serve as Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Public Health, following the removal of former Permanent Secretary Trevor Thomas. Following a recent probe into mismanagement and malpractices obtaining in the process governing the procurement of pharmaceuticals at the Public Health Ministry, it was recommended that Thomas be fired and Adams be “censured and disciplined” for neglecting her duties.
Former Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Education, Delma Nedd, will now function as the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Legal Affairs; while Alfred King, who was previously Permanent Secretary of the Department of Culture, Youth and Sport, will now serve in the same capacity at the Ministry of Indigenous Peoples’ Affairs.
Vibert Welch, who served in that capacity at the Ministry of Indigenous Peoples’ Affairs, has now been moved to the Ministry of Education; and former Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Legal Affairs, Melissa Tucker, will now function as the Permanent Secretary at the Department of Culture, Youth and Sport.
State Minister Joseph Harmon addressing Ministries’ staffers at the closing ceremony of the three-day retreat and workshop on Sunday
Former Head of the Works Services Group of the Ministry of Public Infrastructure, Geoffrey Vaughn, has been elevated to the position of Permanent Secretary of that Ministry. Moreover, Marlyn Stephens of the Public Service Commission has now been assigned as Secretary to the Public/Police Service Commission, and Sophia Hunte is now the acting Secretary of the Teaching Service Commission.
The Permanent Secretaries of the Ministry of Natural Resources, Ministry of Social Protection, Ministry of Public Security, Ministry of Communities, Ministry of Business, Ministry of the Presidency, Department of Public Service, and the Ministry of Public Telecommunications all remain unchanged.
Permanent Secretaries and Heads of the various Departments paying keen attention as Minister Harmon discussed Permanent Secretaries’ responsibilities
According to Harmon, changes in the public service sector are critical to the provision of improved services to citizens. He referred to the performance of the Ministries during 2016, when less than 50 per cent of budgetary allocations were spent at mid-year.
Minister Harmon said, “Last year, in our performance as Ministries, our public sector infrastructure programme, the completion rate was miserably low. Some claimed that they were new in the work, some weren’t sure what was expected, and some were just ambivalent about the consequences of not doing things at the right time. So our performance last year was not good, and we have to do better this year.
“You have to provide a service to the people, and the State gives you a budget to do so; but if at the end of the year you can only show 15, 20 or 30 per cent completion, then something is wrong. We will have to make changes.”
Directly addressing the Permanent Secretaries who were a part of the workshop, Minister Harmon said it is expected that they would be able to continue functioning in their new offices. He added that Government would continue to provide training, where necessary, to ensure their improved performance.
“When you are a public servant, a Permanent Secretary, you have the capacity to function in any Ministry of the Government, because your training is standard. We have invested in training of public servants. We have invested in training at the level of Permanent Secretaries. We are investing at the level of entrants into the public service, and we are investing in training for persons in the middle tier. So we are spending quite a large sum of money in training people; training Guyanese to function at the level that is expected of them. Once you are given that training, much is required (of you),” he said.
