By TANYA SMITH-CARTWRIGHT

tsmith-cartwright@tribunemedia.net

ALTHOUGH the Davis administration initially said it would suspend staff promotions given under the previous government, the incoming Water and Sewerage chairman has admitted promotions have been recently given to certain staff.

Corporation chairman Sylvanus Petty, along with members of his board, were officially appointed in a ceremony at the Ministry of Works yesterday.

Prior to this, a WSC source said the people who were promoted recently were not on the list presented before the election which the corporation has refused to honour. The source also said those who are thought to be Free National Movement supporters are being victimised and held back from promotion.

Mr Petty, in a swipe at former WSC executive chairman Adrian Gibson, said the recent promotions were decided by the board and executive staff.

“We did have a promotion exercise, but the board decided on all promotions,” Mr Petty said. “I am not the former chairman who does everything himself. I have executive members and now I have a board.

“We met with (union leader Dwyane) Woods and then went through the executives for the promotions so there was no victimisation. Like I said we have a lot of work to do and we have the right people in place. We are not playing politics. We are all Bahamian and we all have to work.

“At the end of the day if you are good at what you do, it doesn’t matter if you are a PLP or FNM. The process was followed.”

In the past, there was a tumultuous relationship between WSC and the unions representing its staff; Mr Petty indicated that this will change.

“One of the things that we initiated was to take Mr Woods for lunch,” Mr Petty said. “I want to establish a friendship so it does not have to be contentious. We all have differences and we have to be mature enough to handle our differences. At the end of the day it’s about compromise.”

He also addressed the matter of mass disconnections saying this will be replaced with incentives to encourage Bahamians to pay their water bills.

“There will be no mass disconnections, but we do encourage people to pay their water bills,” he continued. “We have a lot of people who will be in Walmart next week shopping for Christmas, who could afford to pay their water bills.

“We are putting something in place to encourage Bahamians to pay their water bills. We are going to have some commercials come out in a week or two. We are going to be creative and encourage people to pay their water bills.”

Minister of Public Works and Utilities Alfred Sears officially named the new board and was asked about what was going to happen to contracts awarded under the previous board.

“With respect to the conduct of the Water and Sewerage Corporation, the legal process is that the board is now fully constituted, the board will review the affairs historically and also currently and will determine as the law requires the conduct of the corporation,” Mr Sears said.

“As the responsible minister certainly reports will be made to us and we will weigh in. It will be premature without the board having the facts to reach a conclusion about this allegation or the other allegation.

“As you know even with BPL we would have determined that there be rapid assessment which has been recently undertaken by Deloittes. So I think we must give the board an opportunity to be briefed and to sit together as a governance body and determine the way forward. This is rather than going in with an idea.”

The new WSC board includes Mr Petty, an electrical engineer; Kele Isaacs, who currently serves as the chief financial officer at the Island School in Cape Eleuthera; and Alvin Sargent, a sports business consultant.