Final councils ‘before year end’

The final 12 Constituency Councils will be launched before year end, says Minister of Constituency Empowerment Christopher Sinckler.According to the minister, the councils were always ready to be launched but there was a “problem with staffing”. He noted that the launching of the final 12 Constituency Councils would have required an additional ten programme assistants. “The current 18 are working according to how we would hsaid Sinckler.He added: “The Ministry of the Civil Service has been keeping it tight with the creation of posts all over the Public Service . . . . What we have now decided to do, however, is to work collaboratively with the Ministry of Community Development and Culture . . . . We can go ahead now and launch the final 12. And the programme will be fully initiated before the end of this year. We are happy, and I believe we are going to Cabinet in about another three weeks with the final names because the committees have made their selections,” Sinckler said. (MM)