On Wednesday Ministers Oneidge Walrond and Dr Ashni Singh were sworn in as unelected MPs; none of them will have voting rights in the National Assembly as they are “technocrat” ministers.
Technocrat Ministers are those whose names have not been nominated on a party’s list of candidates before the general elections.
Walrond, Minister for Tourism, Industry and Commerce, took his Oath for the second time after deciding that he was not elected properly the first time given that he holds dual citizenship. She resigned and sworn in again as Minister and now as a Senator.
Dr Singh was appointed by President Irfaan Ali on November 5, 2020 as Senior Minister in the President’s Office with responsibility for finance.
Dr Singh has had a long career in public finance, first as a public servant in the roles of Deputy Auditor General and Director of Budget and then as Finance Minister for two terms between 2006 and 2015.
Following the transfer of a ministerial post in 2015, Dr Singh was recruited by the International Monetary Fund’s Department of Fiscal Affairs. At the Fund, Dr Singh worked on a diverse range of countries in Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia and Europe.
At the time of his departure from the Fund, Dr Singh coordinated the organization’s technical support on public financial management across anglophone Africa, as well as in selected Middle Eastern countries.