Government of Timor-Leste

The Public Servant Commission celebrated in July its first anniversary and already has its Strategic Plan defined for the next five years. The priorities that allow the drafting of the Action Plan are already fixed until 2015.

For now, a strategic framework is being developed – a development plan that involves several projects. One is human resource training and development. “Since the Public Service applies a career system, where the permanent civil servants remain until retirement and the possibility of promotion and career progression exists, continuous training must exist, so they may improve their knowledge and their rendered service on a daily basis” defends Libório Pereira, Public Servant Commission President.

Another project that is being developed is the regulation of scholarships for the public servants. Currently, the Secretariat of State for Administrative Reform organizes the scholarships in agreement with the Decree-Law, that, according to Libório Pereira, cannot be applied by other departments.

The purpose of the Public Service Commission is to extend the scope and the responsibility of scholarship attribution to the public servants, “so it reaches everyone, because right now each ministry is organizing different scholarships and that complicates the Commission’s work. The promotions, for example, cannot be defined according to each ministry. We need to have a general norm, generalized, that is applied to all, independently of the area or expertise”, explains the CFP President, adding that, after concluding their studies, the employee has to continue to work for the institution, at least, during three years, otherwise he/she has to pay the investment made by the State, or, in other words, the scholarship value.

Libório Pereira leads the Public Servant Commission since the time that where he was still under the competency of the Ministry of State Administration and Territorial Planning. He confesses that the Commission has to assume their functions with caution, due to the power that he has been attributed with, “for example: the recruitment, appointment, promotion and disciplinary powers are functions of the Commission. We carry out that trust – which was given by this Government – with all caution”.

The Public Servant Commission President considers that, in these recent times, there are many challenges, especially at the human resources and knowledge level. The CFP development strategy goes through the regularization of the temporary employees and training.

Another big challenge is installations. The Public Service Commission is, currently, based in the Ministry of State Administration and Territorial Planning, occupying a limited space. The open bidding for the construction of the CFP building was launched. “We hope to have the building ready before the end of 2011. With appropriate installations, the functioning of the institution that controls the public administration will surely be better”, says the President of the Public Servant Commission.