Members of Parliament were enraged last week upon learning that some districts poorly manage staff records, a situation they attributed to unfairness in public service recruitment processes. This came up as the parliamentary standing committee on social affairs scrutinised a 2010-2011 report by the Public Service Commission (PSC).MP Esperance Mwiza, the Chairperson of the committee, observed that the lack of files and proper filing systems is likely to be part of the earlier reported unfairness in public service.“This issue is related to the reported unfairness in recruitment. If this is the case, on what basis are people interviewed? This simply means they got the jobs under suspicious circumstances,” she said.“If someone has no file, there has to be a reason. It is either the employer who wants to cover up for them, or it is others who remove them. If this matter is not resolved, even the matter of injustice will not end.”The districts in question are Rusizi, Nyamasheke, Nyaruguru, Gakenke, Burera, Kirehe and Kayonza.Olivier Kanamugire, the director of recruitment oversight at the PSC said there were cases of sheer lack of proper storage space, incomplete dossiers, and others.Kanamugire said: “This was observed in different places; for example the total lack of storage and papers are just in disorder, even where the files existed, they were not complete with many lacking things like employment contracts, performance appraisals and others.”“We detailed what should be included in files and requested them to work on it. This year, we intend to go back and check whether our recommendations were acted on.”The commission’s Executive Secretary Angelina Muganza, told the committee that their 2010-2011 findings will act as a baseline from which future action would be premised. “Every employee is supposed to have a complete dossier and those without full dossiers are laid off or asked to bring the documents,” Muganza said, adding that there are also cases where because of poor management and security of records, employees who are fired, go back and remove files.Mwiza requested the PSC to do give the committee a complete audit on the matter.
