Minister of Public Infrastructure David Patterson says he will seek Cabinet’s position on polygraph testing after receiving complaints by employees of the Guyana Energy Agency (GEA).
Patterson told a press briefing at the Ministry yesterday that the results obtained from 72 tests that were done from 2009 to 2013 show that 36 GEA employees failed. In addition, the services of two other persons were terminated after they refused to take the test.
Some of the workers who were dismissed said the circumstances of their firings left a permanent scar on their records and their integrity was being questioned whenever they attempted to seek employment elsewhere, Patterson said.
He added that workers also complained that they were not shown the results of the tests, which were sent directly to the then Head of the Presidential Secretariat Dr Roger Luncheon and the Chief Executive Officer of the GEA Mahender Sharma.
Polygraph testing, which began under the previous administration, was introduced to reduce corruption although its effectiveness has been questioned.
Patterson noted that the questions which workers said they were asked were of a general nature and did not deal with specific work-related issues, such as, “Are you a trustworthy person?”
