Praneeta Prakash 
The Ministry of Public Works is facing a significant challenge in delivering critical infrastructure and maintenance projects due to a lack of experienced personnel.
Permanent Secretary Paula Baleilevuka highlighted this before the Standing Committee on Social Affairs.
Baleilevuka was questioned about the work carried out by the Public Works Department following the disbandment of the Construction Implementation Unit.
“The cabinet approved the establishment of PWD number of people to come back. This is one of the problems that we are facing right now, the lack of experienced people. Qualification is not as important as the experience in terms of building maintenance, road maintenance. We want people who actually can do the work, not knowing what to do, but they don’t know what to do on the ground.”
Baleilevuka adds that re-engaging retired personnel is also proving difficult.
“Right now we have a lot of problems. Most of these people are already over 60. So the current system, if we want to re-engage them, it has to come back to the Prime Minister to approve. So these are some of the challenges that the Ministry is facing.”
He adds that cabinet has approved the recruitment of 700 new positions within the newly reconstituted PWD, which is expected to help stabilize operations.
However, he says the transition is not without its own challenges.
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