Finance not responsible for hiring, firing: Paita

By DYLAN MURRAY
THE hiring and terminating of public servants remains under the authority of the Department of Public Service, says Finance Minister Rainbo Paita.
“Every public servant in the country comes under the Public Service Management Act; they have the act in place to administer under which procedures we can fire them,” he said.
“We don’t have powers to intervene (or oversee) how district finance officers should be playing their role in the district.”
Paita was responding to concerns raised by Markham MP and Deputy Speaker Koni Iguan, regarding the hiring and firing of provincial or district financial officers.
Iguan noted that in a few cases, when given directions from district heads or provincial heads, the financial officers on the ground had told them that they were waiting for directions from the Department of Finance.
“My department (Finance) has no control over how your district treasury is run – that is your responsibility as a member (and DDA chairman),” Paita said.
“They shouldn’t be saying that they are waiting for Finance.”
In giving an example, he said if the district development authority in Markham had passed a budget, it was the district finance manager’s job to implement it.
Paita said that if and when there were issues to do with provincial finance managers, the Finance Department would only facilitate investigations and auditing.
“Unless the advice is coming outside of the budget, then they should seek further advice from Finance.”
Paita said that when there arose the issue of politics on the ground and officers were not following directions from the provincial executive council or provincial governments, the Finance Department always tries to help deal with those issues but that hiring and firing was under another ministry’s area of responsibility.