Minister Charles - her daughter lands top local UNESCO job

There is some uneasiness within the Ministry of Education over the appointment of a close family member of the Minister of Education and Labour, Claris Charles to a top prestigious job in the ministry itself.

According to well-placed sources, the appointment of Minister's Charles daughter, Charmi-ann Charles to head the Local Desk of UNESCO is not going down well with a certain section of staffers at the ministry.

The minister's daughter was given the job, replacing Pauline Finlay who has been handling the desk for several months. The new appointee is currently in Paris, France where UNESCO is headquarters on a familiarisation visit.

A source in the Ministry of Education told this newspaper that there is a great deal of resentment to the minister's daughter since some more senior and qualified staffers felt that they were unfairly overlooked for the top paying job.

He spoke of the new appointee being regarded as much "too green" to be catapulted into such a position."And what was rather nasty about this thing is that the same Pauline (Finlay) who was thrown out of the job had to come and show the girl (the minister's daughter) how to handle the job", he remarked.

Charmi-ann Charles recently graduated from the Mona Campus of the University of the West Indies (UWI) with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Literacy. Prior to this, she was a school teacher at a primary school at  Constantine in St. George's.

Speculation is rife that Grenada is not taking advantage of many of the projects offered by UNESCO for its member states"I can tell you that we can get much more from UNESCO when you compare us with St. Lucia and the other islands. We are really not taking advantage of those opportunities (from UNESCO)", the official said.

The source was not optimistic that the inexperienced Charmi-ann Charles would be up to the job to head the UNESCO Desk within the Ministry of Education and attract additional projects for the island.