While Pat Sinclair-McCalla, chief executive officer of the Public Sector Transformation Unit, seems optimistic about converting the public sector into a specimen of efficacy, in her Sunday, December 20, article, I believe that her committee is dealing with the symptoms of inefficiency and not the problems.

One of the main culprits of inefficiency in the public sector rears its ugly head after every general election and remains masked for a lifetime. The culprit: the power of successive prime ministers to change and rearrange ministries without any regard to synergy, efficacy and simplicity. This has helped to create this disorganisation we have come to accept in the public sector.

Continuous destruction

Just think about it. In my short life, I have seen at least 15 ministries come and go; I have been witness to the continuous destruction of our political heritage, and thus, the rise in cynicism about government. For many Jamaicans, the ministries are meaningless; there is no lineage.

So, Ms Sinclair-McCalla, while many Jamaicans will applaud your sincerity, until Parliament enacts some kind of permanence within the ministerial structure that will enable ministries to gel over time and become efficient, the 'Sinclair-McCalla Report', like so many before it (remember the Orane Report), will gather dust and, in another five years, a new prime-ministerial committee will again be commissioned to do the same thing.

I am, etc.,

MICHAEL BROWN

miguelbro@yahoo.com

Washington, DC