Appointments ‘made on merit’ Medicinal cannabis feasibility findings
ALL board appointments on Stateowned enterprises have been made on merit.
While Deputy Prime Minister Manoa Kamikamica said governments tend to appoint people who have the same political ideology, it was about capability and merit at the end of the day.
“Certainly, the board members I see, and the chairs of the various companies we’ve appointed, they are capable individuals,” he said.
Responding to critics who say the appointments are politically inclined, he said individuals appointed were very capable.
“There has always been an endeavour to try and have a balance of some legal representations, some accounting, financial representation, and also technical representation if required.
“So, I always look at some of these comments with amusement, because it’s certainly in a very broad sense, the selections of boards have been relatively well done.
“I think with governments, they do have appointments of people that are aligned to the way of thinking, and that happens all the time.
“You always have people that are aligned to your political way of thinking. At the end of the day, I think the most important thing is to focus on the capabilities of the individuals as well. On that basis, in a very broad sense, the appointments have been good.”
PLANS are in place to introduce the medicinal cannabis feasibility study findings before Cabinet by mid-2024.
Minister for Trade Manoa Kamikamica said they had done extensive consultations quite successfully and were at the stage of conducting a feasibility study.
“Hopefully, we can get the findings by March or April,” he said.
“And then, that means that I can go back to Cabinet and finalise the whole medicinal cannabis industry.
“The exciting thing about the medical cannabis industry is more about what I’m calling the nutraceutical industry. So other alternative forms of medicine. Somebody shared a video with me and for cerebral palsy, it actually works very well.”
He said this was a very helpful way of giving people a quality life and was clearly in high demand globally. “We think we can play in that market. And so, I’m hoping by April, May, you know, we can start making some announcements about deploying, getting the industry growing.”