The Personnel Act (PW) has been changed in Suriname. After more than seven months of study, this was authorized by the National Assembly on Thursday, June 8 and received 26 votes in favor. “I am delighted that the law has been passed by parliament, especially that Article 28a has included the “no-work-no-pay” article,” said Interior Minister Bronto Somohardjo (Biza), in a succinct and matter-of-fact manner. The minister seeks to establish a little justice within the civil service, as his department is in charge of handling all civil servants’ ups and downs. Somohardjo underlines, “I’m here for those 90%. It cannot be that 90% of government workers dutifully show up to work and devote themselves to the service, while 10% do so on purpose and yet get paid.
More than 1,000 federal officials have filed for early and voluntary retirement, according to data from the mandatory national service registration. This group would first be qualified for a 36-month bridging term to launch their own firm. Later, this was lowered to 24.
With this changed PW, the Biza minister wants to keep his civil servants clean. “Because,” he says, “I found a considerable amount of data.” Somohardjo will present these ambiguities regarding the status of certain officials to parliament at a later stage.
