Kali denies knowledge of BPNG’s advice against recruitment

National, Normal
Source:

The National- Thursday, January 20, 2011

 By VERONICA FRANCIS 

THE Department of Personnel Management has denied knowledge of an advice by the Bank of Papua New Guinea against the employment of a senior Finance Department officer.

The advice was supposedly delivered to Finance secretary Gabriel Yer.

Personnel Management secretary John Kali said had he sighted the concerns raised by the central bank, he 

would have taken into consideration the advice in order to maintain ethical and moral standards of 

the public service.

It was understood that the woman officer was dismissed by her BPNG a few years ago for alleged misappropriation.

In a letter last year, her former employer had advised Finance Department not to recruit her.

However, Kali said he was not aware of the advice until after the officer was recruited.

He said DPM had devolved its powers to departmental heads and it was their obligation to exercise authority and to account for their decisions.

The selection panel involved in recruiting this particular officer comprised Yer, minister for finance, senior departmental staff and Kali. 

An AusAID adviser was also engaged to screen the candidate before a decision was made by the selection panel.

“I want to clarify that the officer recruited by the Finance Department passed the criteria and was preferred among other applicants because of her qualification, technical competencies, management and work experiences,” Kali said.

Asian Development Bank country director Charles Andrews also confirmed that they had formerly engaged the services of the same officer as a consultant under its public finance management project.

Andrews said while he was also informally told about the matter, it did not influence their decision to renew her contract.

“She has the experience, has performed extremely well and got the project going,” he added.