The G-7 break also forced the Prime Minister to agree to a Senate inquiry into Social Security's investment programs, particularly for the period during which Social Security came under Ralph Fonseca's ministerial purview. Almost two years later, that Senate report has been on the Prime Minister's desk for a week and he still has not announced whether he will agree to its recommendations that CEO Narda Garcia and Chairman Yasin Shoman must be removed.
But tonight, reliable sources tell 7NEWS that the Prime Minister will announce his decision on Wednesday; he is expected to announce that both Garcia and Shoman will be relieved of their posts.
The decision comes after a week of practical and political deliberations. The political dimension involves Deputy Prime Minister John Briceno who only returned to the country on Friday. He has been an avowed defender of Garcia. So on Friday evening, Attorney General Francis Fonseca, Deputy Briceno and Garcia herself met with the Prime Minister.
Reports are that it was a contentious meeting in which it was made clear to an irate Garcia that she will be dismissed, without a golden parachute; that is, without Social Security paying out her full contract which has four years remaining on it, valued at close to half a million dollars. Garcia and her husband and fellow Social Security employee Greg Garcia, who is also a PUP standard bearer, have indicated that they will fight it energetically.
Deputy Prime Minister Briceno may have been trying to give Garcia a boost today when he appeared at the Social Security office and visited with her.
Still, it's not as if on Wednesday, the Prime Minister will say the word and she will be gone. Garcia was appointed by a board and she must be removed by that board, not by Prime Ministerial decree, so the mechanics of it, may need some ironing out. Garcia, now notified that she will not have her contract paid out, is, as we understand it, examining her legal options.
And what about the Senate report, when will it be made public? Well, if everyone waited around to do things on government's timing, we'd be waiting in long lines for a long time. The report, all 125 pages, has been posted on freeBelize.org.
