The Tribune

By DANA SMITH

Tribune Staff Reporter

dsmith@tribunemedia.net

AMID criticism over the government’s performance during its first year in office – especially in terms of job creation – State Minister for Finance Michael Halkitis said the government cannot allow such comments to “distract us from continuing to work”.

Following inquiries from the opposition over a PLP campaign pledge to create 10,000 jobs, Mr Halkitis said the government is expecting unemployment figures to continue to decline and the Christie administration will “work to fulfil all of our commitments” within their five-year term.

“This month, the Department of Statistics will be doing its labour force survey; so, in a few months, they will tell us what the unemployment rate for May would be,” Mr Halkitis said.

“When that comes out, we expect the unemployment rate to be down; more jobs would have been created.”

Recalling the prior labour force survey of last November, which showed a slight decline in the country’s persistent unemployment problem from 14.7 per cent to an even 14 per cent, Mr Halkitis said that .7 per cent decrease represents the creation of more than 1,900 jobs.

He added the government is hoping there will be a “better” results with the next labour force survey.

“You know, we’re in politics and we’re all grown people so you get criticism and your opponents will say you’re a failure and say all sorts of things,” Mr Halkitis said.

“The prime minister said yesterday, we have a five-year programme, we’ve been elected for a five-year terms and we’re going to work to fulfil all of our commitments within that five years. We know that the problem of unemployment is an acute one, 14 per cent – while down from what it was – is unacceptable, so we have to keep working.

“The detractors will say it’s been failure, we cannot let that distract us from continuing to work, so we’ll continue to work. We’ll take that and we’ll bear that. We don’t agree, we see some things happening on the horizon, we’re optimistic and we think better days are ahead.

“We can debate on the 10,000 (jobs) – we think we’re moving in the right direction. Some things have happened and some things are on the drawing board, so we thank the Bahamian people on this first anniversary for reposing their faith in us and we pledge to them that over the next four years, we’ll continue to work hard on their behalf.”