Farewell ceremony for retired staffs
The Department of Personal Management and Administrative Services gave eight retired employees with their family members a farewell ceremony on Wednesday at the Hutjena High School Hall.
The retirees were from different departments and have served their time as a public servant with the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) and each of them received gifts with a retirement cheque payment.
Deputy Secretary for Policy and Planning, Thomas Raivet acknowledged the retirees for their commitment and hard work over the past 40 years with the public service.
“I’d like to extend these special words of thank you to the retirees because it is a dedication of 30 or 40 years of loyalty, commitment and sacrifice. In those years, if you would have been a business man or women, it would have been a different story but we are here to witness your retirement as a public servant.”
“On behalf of the Public Service Minister, I would like to extend his sincere words of appreciation, for you have served your time very well.”
Mr Raivet shared his personal experience of when he was forced to retire in 2016, at his former job and is now serving as a public servant.
“ I had to adjust to the situation I was in. But for many of us, it is a time of fear and uncertainty because we do not know what the next chapter of life would be like.”
“This is only another chapter. I may not call it a retirement because God will have other plans for you,” he said.
Andrew Dovaro, who represented the retirees made a response.
When we first joined the public service, many of us were working under foreigners who had occupied many of the positions and as the Public Service Act states, when an employee reaches that age, they must retire, he said.
“For myself, I see this as a good thing. We must vacate our positions, retire and move on in life. There are many other things to do”
“If we continue to work, even though, we have reached the age, we would find ourselves sleeping during work hours and this is bad.”
Mr Dovarao thanked the staff of the Department of Personal Management and Administrative Services in Buka and in Port Moresby for their efforts in ensuring that the retirement payments were processed and ready.
This is the first time the ABG recognized the work of the public servants who have retired. In the past, retirees were given their pay and sent home without a farewell ceremony, he said.
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