No thank you, Mwatela says

Former Central Bank deputy governor Jacinta Mwatela on Tuesday said she had decided to pursue other interests instead of taking

In a rare case, Mrs Mwatela who was moved from the CBK last week to the new Development of Northern Kenya Ministry said it would be useless for her to take the PS job only four months to her retirement.

In an interview with the Nation, a jovial Mrs Mwatela questioned why the Government deemed it fit to transfer her from CBK when she was just about to retire. Mrs Mwatela will be 55 in December, the official public servants retirement age.

“It would be a disservice for me to take up a job as an accounting officer in the new ministry and retire just after four months,” she added. “As a human being, I think I do have the right to say thanks, but I don’t think I can handle that job.”

She further said issues surrounding her removal from the CBK and the manner in which it was done indicated that she was not wanted by those in authority and, therefore, it was useless for her to take the new job.

And borrowing a line from one of Bob Marley’s song Mrs Mwatela said: “When one door is closed another one opens…‘every cloud has its silver lining’.”

In the meantime, the former CBK deputy Governor said the transfer could have presented a good opportunity for her to concentrate on family matters.

“My youngest child is 16 years. She keeps telling me, ‘mum you don’t have time for us. Please get more time...’ I think now she is getting compensated for the time lost,” she observed while holding a Stephen Covey’s book Seven Habits of Highly Effective Families.

However, she took issue with the manner in which she was transferred from the CBK, saying, she learnt it through her secretary who had received a news alert through a mobile short text message service.

Mrs Mwatela asked why public servants were never consulted or informed of transfers in advance rather than “shocking them through the media”.

Although Mrs Mwatela said she was not opposed to working anywhere else in the Government, she noted that the manner in which she was moved and the way it was handled indicated someone “did not want me”.

“It was clear from the day I was showed the message of my transfer by my secretary that ‘whoever does not want you, does not tell you outright’,” she said, adding, her experience was humiliating enough, and it would be stupid for her to take the new job as a PS.

Mrs Mwatela asked jokingly: “Is that job still there anyway? I should have been consulted or informed so that I embrace it. But they wanted to humiliate me and I know I’m not wanted.”

She spoke just a day after Attorney-General Amos Wako said the deputy governor does not enjoy security of tenure.

The AG’s comments brought to and end a week-long war of words between the Government and some politicians who had read mischief in her transfer.

Mrs Mwatela maintained her removal was unprocedural. “I am coming from a job where I thought I had protection. The AG is now telling me at the end of it that I didn’t have that protection.”

She said she could not take up her new job because she was a “total stranger” to its operations having worked at CBK for 31 years.

Although she would have been happy to work in the new ministry having come from an arid area herself, it would have been difficult for her since she has never been a civil servant.

She asked: “Does it bother you that this ministry is being given to someone who has never worked as a civil servant? It bothers me! This is a country people are running it is not a rehearsal.”

Her letter last Friday to Public Service chief Francis Muthaura seeking clarification on why she had been appointed to two high profile jobs (deputy Governor and PS) is yet to elicit response.

Holding a copy of the Nation, she said all information from the Government had been through the media, a sign that she was being hounded out of CBK. “I also view it as attempts to intimidate me.”

She took issue with accusations that she was defiant. Being firm and asking for proper procedures to be followed did not amount to defiance, she said. “I have never been defiant... I like being respected and I respect authority, but we have a long way to go on how we communicate.”

She denied reports that her “fate” had been sealed saying it was only God who could do it.

“I take my fate as a very serious issue, and it is only in the hands of my Maker,” Mrs Mwatela who also sang a hymn praising the lord added.

Mrs Mwatela removed her personal effects immediately she received the message of the transfer.