Police Commission revokes handing of appointment letters

Yesterday the Police Service Commission “revoked” the customary method of the handing of letters of appointment to senior police officers which in the past had been done through the Director of Personnel Administration (DPA). From now on the Chairman of the Police Service Commission will not only sign the letters of appointment but will deliver the letter personally to the officers “at any regular meeting of the Commission”. Yesterday’s action follows the unprecedented decision of the DPA to hand over the letter of appointment of Police Commissioner Everald Snaggs to Zaida Rajnauth, Head of the Public Service, who is also Permanent Secretary to the Prime Minister for transmission to Manning. It was Rajnauth who requested the letter from the DPA for Manning.

Kenneth Lalla, Chairman of the Police Service Commission yesterday refused to answer questions as to the reason why Prime  Minister Patrick Manning presented the letter of appointment as Commissioner of Police to  Everald Snaggs and why it was not done in the normal way through the DPA to the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of National Secretary. “I wouldn’t want to get involved with that at this stage,” Lalla said. “The Commission will make a statement about that at some point in time.” However, yesterday, a few hours after these statements were made by Lalla, the Service Commissions Department, under which both the Public Service Commission and the Police Service Commission fall, issued a press release following a joint meeting of the First and Second Division Police with the Police Service Commission.

The release stated that it was the Chairman of the Police Service Commission who will now sign letters of police promotion instead of the Director of Personnel Administration (DPA), and it was the Chairman of the Commission who would deliver such letters to the appointee at any regular meeting of the Commission. The release also stated that the established procedure has now been revoked. Prior to yesterday’s decison the procedure was for  the Director of Public Adminstration to sign the letter of promotion on behalf of the Commission and forward same to the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of National Security for delivery to the Commissioner of Police. There has been severe criticism from many quarters of  Manning’s decision to hand the letter personally to Snaggs. At his weekly press briefing yesterday, Manning said it was a “symbolic gesture” in his capacity as Chairman of the National Security Council.