Contract employees and political change

Jul 17, 2017 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

The Deeds Registry and the Commercial Registry have vacancies. They have advertised for applicants to fill the positions of Internal Auditor, Information Technology Systems Manager, Office Assistant and Administrative Assistant.
The remuneration package for each of the positions provides for a gratuity which means that the positions are not public service positions. The persons selected to fill the vacancies will be on contract, even the office assistant.
The APNU and the AFC, when they were in the opposition, had lambasted the PPP/C for the large number of contract employees on government payrolls.
The APNU and the AFC now form the coalition government and they are doing the very thing which they had condemned the PPP/C about. They are employing large numbers of workers on contract rather than as public servants.
The APNU+AFC made no bones that the system of public administration would have been different. They made it clear that there were far too many contract employees.
So what really has changed in terms of the public service in Guyana? The staunchest supporters of the APNU+AFC will find it difficult to find five things which have changed for the better in the public service since the coalition took over just over two years ago. The public service continued to be inflated by contract employees.
The faces have changed. The new government has imported their own supporters into the system. The public service is now bloated. Those affiliated or believed to be associated with the PPP/C are being slowly but surely weeded out.
When the government first came into office there was a lot of talk about creating a professional public service. It was stated that persons who were on the list of representatives for political parties would not be considered for appointments within the public service. This commitment has been honored in the breach.
Persons who were on the list of candidates of the PPP/C were retained. One person who was on a regional list was actually promoted. One individual on the PPP/C’s list was actually retained as the Head of an agency. Persons on the APNU list were selected to fill senior positions which under a professional public service should have been advertised and filled by public servants.
Political cronies have also been catapulted to high office in other government agencies and they are exercising tremendous influence. Ex-military personnel can be seen policing ministries and government agencies. Some of them hardly do anything. SOCU and SARU are yet to justify the faith which has been placed in them.
They are yet to tell the Guyanese people who stole what, how much was stolen, where the proceeds are and how it intends to get them back.
Instead, all kind of politically motivated charges are appearing while the Guyana people, long led to believe that the PPP/C was running a kleptocracy, are yet to see the hundreds of billions of dollars that was said to have been stolen and stashed away. Follow the money and you will find the criminal.
A professional public service is supposed to be free of partisan politics. You cannot be painting the National Sports Hall and the Ministry of the Presidency in green and in the same breath want to have a non-partisan public service.
Party cards and nepotism cannot be the basis of creating a professional public service. A professional public service involves advertising positions and having a competitive process of applications and interviews. The hand-picking of persons can lead to a situation in which the best person and the most competitive wage packages are ignored. Square pegs in round holes and overpriced employees will end up in the system.
The fact that the PPP/C did something should not be the justification for the APNU+AFC doing likewise. Guyanese voted for change not exchange. By the way is it true that 25 percent of the annual education tax is being used to send a delegation to CARIFESTA?

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