Gov’t has no confidence in Brassington – Harmon

The current government has no confidence in the Head of the National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited (NICIL), Winston Brassington says Minister of State Joseph Harmon.

“Mr Brassington could never enjoy the confidence of this government. We have made it clear. I made it clear, the president made it clear, cabinet has made it clear that Mr. Brassington does not enjoy our confidence. Mr. Brassington is in what I call a holding pattern just as many officials are… Mr. Brassington does not enjoy the confidence of this government”, Harmon told reporters yesterday. He was at the time fielding questions from reporters following his weakly post-cabinet press briefing.

Asked if Brassington will be going, he responded “I don’t care whether he gone or not he does not enjoy our confidence”.

Winston Brassington
Winston Brassington

Brassington is also Chairman of Atlantic Hotel Inc (AHI) which owns the controversial Marriott Hotel.

Meanwhile, Charles Ramson Snr., the Commissioner of Information is still on the job, according to Harmon who noted that he is a constitutional appointee.

Harmon did not say no or yes to a question on whether government wants him removed but said that as the commissioner of information he ought to be in a place where people can go to him to seek required information.

“In this compound (Ministry of the Presidency) it is a little too restricted in my view and I have spoken to Mr. Ramson about that and he himself would prefer to have a facility such as like the ombudsman and people like that where he can actually have a closer interaction with the public and we will be looking at that”, he said.

Ramson was appointed to the post in May 2013.

With regards to Alexei Ramotar, the son of former president Donald Ramotar, Harmon disclosed that he certainly will not continue to head the E-Governance project.

Harmon said that since he took up his post at the Ministry of the Presidency he has not seen the younger Ramotar.

The $3.1 billion project commenced in 2011 and was supposed to be completed in 2012. However, several setbacks occurred and the project was suspended.