Ministry of Health’s Personnel Department: A Case Study in Government Inefficiency

Jun 13, 2026 Letters

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Dear Editor,

The Government of Guyana has rightly placed significant emphasis on improving efficiency and service delivery across the public sector. If that objective is to be taken seriously, then attention must urgently be directed toward one of the most dysfunctional units within the Ministry of Health: the Personnel Department.

For many health workers, dealing with the Personnel Department has become an exercise in frustration, endurance, and wasted time. Whether one is applying for a position, seeking approval for leave, following up on gratuity payments, or resolving a simple personnel matter, the experience is often the same. Applications appear to disappear into a black hole, only for employees to be told months later to resubmit documents because records cannot be located. The process then begins all over again.

This is not an occasional inconvenience. It is a recurring pattern that affects health workers across the country.

The Ministry of Health has actively recruited healthcare workers from Spanish-speaking countries to strengthen the sector. Yet, despite the growing number of Spanish-speaking employees, there appears to be little consideration for how these workers navigate the Personnel Department. On any given day, one can observe Spanish-speaking employees struggling to communicate their concerns and understand responses. It is difficult to understand why no effort has been made to ensure the availability of Spanish-speaking personnel to assist these workers.

Communication with the department is equally problematic. Telephone calls frequently go unanswered, leaving employees with no choice but to travel in person to the Ministry’s Brickdam office. In many cases, health workers must leave their duty stations, sometimes for an entire day, simply to follow up on matters that should be resolved through a phone call or email.

The consequences extend beyond employee frustration. Every hour spent chasing personnel matters is an hour taken away from healthcare delivery. Every unresolved leave request, delayed gratuity payment, or misplaced application affects staff morale, productivity, and ultimately the quality of service delivered to patients.

Particularly troubling are the numerous complaints regarding gratuity payments. It is not uncommon to hear workers discussing gratuity applications submitted months ago that remain unresolved. Some applications reportedly date back to December 2025, yet employees continue to wait for updates while another cycle of gratuity payments approaches.

Bonded scholars face similar challenges. Many require timely approvals for overseas travel, yet applications are routinely delayed and misplaced, and now requires resubmission. These are not complex policy issues requiring months of deliberation. These are basic administrative functions that any modern personnel department should be able to manage efficiently.

What is perhaps most concerning is that these problems are widely known. One only needs to spend a short time in the waiting area of the Personnel department to hear the stories, frustrations, and complaints of employees. These issues are not hidden. They are visible, audible, and experienced daily by the very people responsible for delivering healthcare services throughout Guyana.

Personnel departments are meant to be people-centered. They exist to support employees, facilitate administrative processes, and ensure that staff can focus on their core responsibilities. Unfortunately, the experience within the Ministry of Health’s Personnel Department often suggests the opposite.

If the Government is serious about improving efficiency, then reform must begin with fixing the everyday administrative failures that affect workers directly. Better record management systems, service standards, accountability mechanisms, digital tracking of applications, and multilingual support are not luxuries. They are basic necessities.

Health workers deserve better. They should not have to spend months pursuing basic administrative requests. They should not have to abandon their posts to seek answers that should be readily available. And they should not have to navigate a system that seems designed to create obstacles rather than provide assistance.

Improving healthcare is NOT only about building hospitals and purchasing equipment. It is also about ensuring the public servants who keep the system running are treated with professionalism, efficiency and respect.

Until these issues are addressed, the Ministry’s Personnel Department will remain a glaring example of the very inefficiencies the Government says it is committed to eliminating.

Yours respectfully,

Ashley Barakat

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• Ashley Barakat, Government Inefficiency, Letters, Ministry of Health, Personnel Department

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