Region 5 REO, chairman hammer out working relationship

THE Regional Executive Officer of Region Five (Mahaica/Berbice)and top Officials of the Regional Democratic Council have hammered out a working relationship agreement which is intended to prevent the conflicts and frictions which marked the relationship between the administration and the Chairman of the PPP/C dominated Council last year.

REO Ovid Morrison made the disclosures at a media briefing on the work of the Regional Administration in 2017 on Tuesday. Regional Chairman, Vickchand Ramphal was absent from the media briefing which was held in the Boardroom of the RDC at Fort Wellington, West Coast Berbice on the grounds that he had to address some mechanical problems which developed with his mode of transportation.

During last year most of the Statutory Meetings of the RDC were not held due to the walkout of APNU/AFC Councilors in support of the REO who said he had been offended by “disrespectful” actions of Mr.Ramphal. Both Morrison and APNU/AFC Councillors had accused Ramphal of bias in favor of the PPP/C Party of poor leadership and poor governance of the Council. During most of last year Morrison and Ramphal had not been communicating.

Despite the friction however the administration achieved its operational objectives for 2017 because the budget had been approved at the level of the Council before the tensions emerged. On Tuesday Morrison disclosed that the “working relationship agreement” had been hammered out during a meeting between himself, Ramphal and Regional Vice-Chairman, Rion Peters.

Morrison said that during the meeting it had been recognized that there may have been some misunderstanding among members of the Council on the roles of the REO as against the role of the Council itself. He said that he pointed out that it is basically the role of the Council to make policies and make decisions on programmes and basically the role of the REO to execute these policies and programmes.

“I stressed that I would like to see the policy-makers make the policy and allow the Administration to execute the policies and directions. The Council should not cross over into carrying out the management duties of the REO. You cannot make a policy and execute it. Council makes the policy and it is my responsibility to carry out that policy. You can’t want to make policy and also carry out that policy, that would be wrong,” he stressed.

“The agreement essentially means that myself as REO and Mr Ramphal as Chairman of the Council will be working together once again, communicating with each other as often as necessary in the interests of harmonious relationships between the Administration and the leadership of the Council. There should be no cancellations of statutory meetings this year.” Morrison said he hoped that the relationship would remain amicable this year due to respect on his behalf of the role of the Council and respect from the Chairman of the Council for his role as the Regional Executive Officer.

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