ST GEORGE’S, Grenada (GIS) — Prime Minister Dr Keith Mitchell says his seven-week old administration in Grenada has resisted the culture of political witch-hunt and victimization.
Mitchell made the disclosure while explaining the reason some persons who worked with government went home after the February 19 general election.
In an address to the nation on Tuesday night, the prime minister said a new arrangement between the previous administration and some government workers was not in the employees’ best interest.
“The only people that have gone home are those who were contracted under the arrangement the previous administration made under the new system of the Office of the Prime Minister and his chief of staff; and some in the youth programme,” Mitchell explained.
“Those people so contracted under the PMO were deemed by the previous government as political appointees, whose contract expired with that of the regime which they served”.
The prime minister said that, in the coming weeks, his government will attempt to rehire some of the workers where necessary.
Those affected include persons who manned Outreach offices and others hired under the Government Information Service system.
“It was an arrangement that we could have done little to change,” the prime minister said.
“While we were glad to see the end of the contracts of the many high-paying, blatantly-political hirings under that system, we are also sensitive to the fact that some lower ranked people were unnecessarily exposed under this unfortunate arrangement,” Mitchell said.
Overall, the prime minister said, his new administration has kept its promise of saving jobs.