Minister
for Public Enterprises, Sir Mekere Morauta, today announced that the O’Neill-Namah
Government had abolished the Department of Public Enterprises.
He said the
decision, approved by National Executive Council, was to reduce waste and inefficiency.
“The
Department has a recurrent budget of K4 million a year and a development budget
of K5 million,” he said.
“Yet there is
no evidence of any constructive policy input from the Department to myself as
Minister, or the previous Minister.
“It was
created by the former Government with an establishment of 61 positions and
personal emoluments of K3.5 million. "Yet it has only a Secretary and 18 staff.”
Sir Mekere
said the redeployment of the 18 staff within the Public Service, without loss
of service or employment rights and to avoid costly retrenchment, was being
considered.
The policy and
advice functions of the department will revert to Treasury and IPBC.
“IPBC was
never set up to be a policy-making institution like Treasury, Planning, or
Attorney-General’s,” Sir Mekere said. “Nor is it a co-ordinating department.
“Its job is
simply to manage and repair Public Enterprises under its control. That is its
core function.
“When we need
policy input, we will consult the relevant departments.”
No comments:
Post a Comment