BIZA to send missions to districts

The Ministry of Home Affairs (BIZA) has received permission from President Chandrikapersad Santokhi to send missions to the districts to register the state employees. “In order to make the state’s workforce more efficient, we need data. That is why we started with the registration of state employees,” said Minister Bronto Somohardjo. After the data has been processed officials can start looking for solutions for the 4 categories of state employees that have been identified by the ministry. “We expect to have a complete picture of the number of state employees around mid December. After that we will determine how we will reform the workforce,” said the minister.

One of the solutions is early retirement. Another solution is the establishment of a big employment agency which will lend state employees to the private sector. The minister is pleased about the fact that many state employees answered the call to get registered in Paramaribo. That registration ended on October 18. “There are indications that there are about 2,000 inactive state employees at the ministry. Just like the policy advisors this group will also be summoned. Only 100 policy advisors showed up after being summoned. The other 300 will also have to get registered, if they want to work. We also took a look at the labor agreements for certain services. We terminated 250 contracts because no services were being rendered to the state. We managed to save the state millions of Surinamese dollars. If you want to work, we have a spot for you. If not, we will act according to the Personnel Law.” Minister Somohardjo pointed out that reforming the state’s workforce will not be easy but be strongly believes that it can be done. “We are on the right track thanks to the state employees who got registered. 5,000 people who are in the files of BIZA showed up at the registration. They do not work for the Office of the President, The Office of the VP and the National Security Directorate.