The Utilities Regulation and Competition Authority (URCA) ‘broke the rules’ when it hired a foreign human resources consultant in 2009 without advertising that position locally, Prime Minister Hubert Ingraham said Saturday.
URCA has already admitted that Marsha Lewis of Barbados was introduced to URCA by Usman Saadat, who currently serves as the agency’s CEO, but was at the time its director of policy and regulation.
Saadat is the former CEO of Cable and Wireless Communications (CWC) St. Lucia, and Lewis is the former vice president for human resources at CWC Barbados. Her husband is currently CWC’s vice president for Business Development.
“We certainly do not support that kind of thing,” said Ingraham in an interview with The Nassau Guardian.
He was referring specifically to URCA’s failure to advertise the HR position locally.
“We expect URCA to follow the government’s requirements and the government requirements from the Public Service Commission are that all jobs be advertised locally.”
URCA’s Chairman Wayne Aranha acknowledged last Thursday that Saadat, when he applied for the CEO position last year, was required like all other applicants to forward his resume to Lewis for vetting.
“Now that you brought this to my attention, we will write to them (URCA) and say we expect them to comply with the standard policy for accessing personnel by advertising locally first or concurrently.
Former Senator Darron Cash, said given that URCA is a small organization, it is hard for the regulatory body to justify the engagement of a foreigner to do human resources consultancy.
Aranha, URCA’s CEO, has stressed that Lewis has no role in regulation and does not make decisions on hiring.
