A proposal has been discussed by the newly elected Dickon Mitchell-led National Democratic Congress (NDC) government to offer a short-term contract to former Cabinet Secretary Gemma Bain-Thomas and another top ex-civil servant to help provide some level of training for the Permanent Secretaries appointed to serve the new administration.
A member of the newly installed government told THE NEW TODAY that this is getting high priority in order to help upgrade the skills of the Permanent Secretaries and to get them up to speed with the agenda of the Congress administration.
Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell has taken the initiative to appoint a number of persons to serve as Transition Leaders in helping his one-month old government to fully take over the reign of power from the defeated New National Party (NNP) government of former Prime Minister Dr. Keith Mitchell.
At least four senior civil servants have been promoted to serve as Permanent Secretaries since the June 23 change of government in which new Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell came to power in a 9-6 victory over Dr. Keith Mitchell’s NNP.
The four are Carvel Lett (Acting Permanent Secretary with responsibility for National Security, Home Affairs, Information and Disaster Management), Lyndonna Hillaire-Marshall (Acting Permanent Secretary of Public Administration, and Home Affairs), Naomi Jeremiah (Acting Permanent Secretary with responsibility for Strategic and Operational Management of the General and Subsidiary Hospitals like Mt. Gay Psychiatric Hospital) and Peron Johnson (Acting Permanent Secretary Ministry of Mobilization, Implementation and Transformation).
A source within the Transition team expressed alarm at the lack of an administrative government that was left behind by the NNP regime.
“The honest truth, my classification of the Ministry of ……. it’s in a near death coma. Mostly all the posts are vacant – nothing is happening, absolutely nothing,” she said.
“It is a major task to get it back up and running. I think that may be the case in almost every ministry,” she added.
According to the source, the ministers in the defeated Keith Mitchell government were seemingly just going through the motions in running the affairs of the country.
“It’s sad,” she quipped.