The Department of the Public Service yesterday handed to the Ministry of Public Telecommunications (MoPT) a report in which it recommended that two former senior managers of the now defunct National Frequency Management Unit (NFMU) be compensated for being wrongfully dismissed 20 years ago.
The report was handed over after a press conference during which certain elements of the report were shared with media operatives.
Present were Derrick Cummings, Permanent Secretary of the MoPT, Karen Vansluytman-Corbin, Permanent Secretary of the Department of Public Service, and Francis Carryl, a legal consultant.
Vansluytman-Corbin and Carryl are the co-authors of the report.
Pursuant to the report’s recommendations, the former employees, Keith Griffith and Robert Ross, received their compensation packages on August 26, 2019, which was a percentage of what was actually recommended, Cummings said. The payout was made by the MoPT as this entity has replaced the NFMU
Cummings also said that the report was completed before the NFMU went defunct, but that the then head of the agency was not in agreement with its recommendations. By the time the issue was sorted out, he explained, the NFMU was defunct. Eventually, it was determined that the MoTP was the appropriate entity to be engaged on the matter, Cummings said.
The handing over, and certain aspects of the report were shared with the public in light of the historical nature of the issue, that is, that the dismissals occurred in 1998, and the way in which the former employees were treated, Cummings told the media.
The report itself, and the quantum of compensation were not shared with the public as per a confidential agreement between the bodies and Griffith and Ross, as per the insistence of the former employees, Vansluytman-Corbin explained. Cummings added, however, that a request can be made to the minister to access the report, and the quantum of the compensation can be revealed by Griffith and Ross.
In a press release sent out on September 25 2019, the MoPT said that the report follows an investigation triggered after the men “appealed internally to H.E. President David Granger” who referred the matter to the subject Ministry – MoPT which then collaborated with the MoSP to resolve the matter. Cummings shared yesterday that the complaint was made in March 2016, and sought to make it clear that there was no directive by the President to look into the matter.
Instead, he said, Granger merely passed the matter to the relevant government agency. The September 25 release said that the decision followed collaboration among four ministries: the Ministry of the Presidency, MoPT, the Ministry of Social Protection (MoSP) and the Ministry of Legal Affairs.
The release also said that “The two Ministries investigated the complaints which required the examination of available historical records which were more than a decade old, and interviewed relevant personnel, some of whom were already retired. No evidence was unearthed to justify or substantiate the actions taken against these employees.”
Ultimately, it was found that “a grave wrong had been done to the two men and therefore submitted that the dismissal should not be allowed to stand. The recommended course of action is compensation, and that recommendation has been endorsed by the Attorney General’s Chambers.”
