Email mix-up kept opposition from conference

| 06/06/2019 | 22 Comments

Cayman News Service(CNS): Opposition MLAs missed the anti-corruption seminar this week because the invitations were sent to the wrong email addresses, though this does not explain why all of the members from the government benches failed to show up. Commissions Secretariat Manager Deborah Bodden said that the gov.ky emails were used for the invitations for all 19 members as they were unaware that the opposition MLAs do not have access to government email addresses.

“It is with regret that I have become aware that the ‘save the date’ invitations which were sent to the honourable members of the opposition went to ‘gov.ky’ email addresses. While these accounts appear in the email system, the accounts are not operational,” she said in a statement to the media. “We relied upon these addresses when sending out the emails and I have apologised for this unintended administrative error.”

Taking responsibility for the oversight, she apologised to the members and explained that the Secretariat of the constitutional commissions, including the Standards in Public Life and Anti-Corruption Commissions, was updating its central email directory to remove defunct accounts and replace them with the active email addresses for the members.

Opposition Leader Arden McLean said the mistake resulted in a missed opportunity for the opposition to be involved in an important discussion on good governance for our country. “We want to assure the organisers and the public that this opposition remains committed to fighting corruption and we fully support the commission in its efforts,” he said.

But despite the missing invitations, the former opposition leader, Ezzard Miller, did attend several sessions during the week. He confirmed that he and all of the members of the Public Accounts Committee were aware of the conference since the chair of the Standards in Public Life Commission had extended invitations when she appeared at the last hearing.

All of the government members do have active gov.ky email address and therefore received the formal invitations. The conference was also publicised in the local press.

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Tags: , , , ,

Category: Politics

Comments (22)

Trackback URL | Comments RSS Feed

  1. Anonymous says:

    CNS why do I get the message ‘you are posting comments to quickly’ when I just write one comment of two lines and then lose it?

    CNS: This is a WordPress issue. I have found code fixes in various forums but I’m not convinced that they wouldn’t cause more harm than good. Hopefully WordPress will sort it out in one of their updates.

  2. Anonymous says:

    Next time just send them a whatsapp message. A smoke signal. A message in a bottle. A message delivered by a dove. A courier message or a fax. Snail mail the message by registered mail. Hey call them even.

    11
    • Anonymous says:

      Don’t the MLAs have a responsibility to ensure their correct email addresses are carried in the gov system?

      Pick up your phones and call the Computer Services Department and make sure they have the relevant email address and have them delete the inoperable ones. And stop the eternal winging about this—I have heard this before—not the first time this has happened.

      It should be easily solved. All the MLAs have offices run by paid assistants. Further, why is it that the govt has Ezzard’s correct email address and not theirs?

      9
      1
  3. Shamemonger says:

    Total BS. They already knew about it and also how do you get “mla.name@gov.ky” wrong ? Seriously; how stupid do they think the public is ?

    12
    1
    • Jotnar says:

      Didnt get the e mail address wrong. Because the government e mail system has those email addresses on it, and advertises them as a contact points for the opposition MLAs, but the opposition MLAs cannot access them because the government doesn’t allow them access to the email system!! Bit like me setting up an e mail for you, telling everyone that’s your e mail, but not giving you the password so you can access all the emails people then send you. I wouldn’t blame you for not being able to access the email someone sent you, nor would I blame the person that sent it for assuming you would get it. It would be my fault.

  4. Anonymous says:

    LOL It is not high school. They knew about it just as Ezzard did, but because they did not receive EMails that was their excuse? OMG

    18
    1
  5. Anonymous says:

    Another fantasy day in the world-class Cayman Islands Civil Service.

    Glory be to that place!

    39
    4
  6. Anonymous says:

    And I did not have sexual relations with that woman.

    I wonder what would happen in case of emergency if emails are being sent to the wrong addresses?

    So I don’t buy the excuse, because if it is true, the level of ineptness of people in charge is mind blowing. Besides, everyone has a smart phone!

    40
    2
  7. Anonymous says:

    Yeah, right. The least plausible explanation ever. Do they think people are idiots?

    40
    3
  8. Anonymous says:

    Yet somehow Ezzard claims to have received the invitation. Was it left on his windshield?

    CNS: That’s not what he said.

    19
    11
  9. Anonymous says:

    Good on you Ms. Bodden for taking responsibility for this administrative error, but it seems apparent that this conference was not a secret and so anyone who thought they SHOULD have been invited but were not, should have contacted you.

    The e-mail system definitely needs to be cleaned up if there are addresses which are no longer operational but still appear as possible recipients.

    25
    8
  10. Anonymous says:

    Why would the government create ‘non-operational’ e-mail addresses?

    33
    2
    • Say it like it is says:

      12.52pm No different to most of their websites which have not been updated in years.

      32
      1
      • Anonymous says:

        Or many of their departments who are as useful as chalk on a dry erase board. To name a few- customs, worc, DVDL, and Labour.

    • Anonymous says:

      Computer Services create gov.ky email addresses for each MLA after each election. But, generally, only the Ministers and Councilors check them (when in their GAB office I assume). But because its an active email address in the system you don’t get a bounce-back and as far as you know your email went to their official email address. As someone who’s had the same problem happen to me I can attest that the lack of posted MLA email addresses makes it very hard for the Civil Service to get in touch with non-government MLAs. You just hope that your boss can find someone high enough up the chain who’s accumulated a cache of VIP’s personal email addresses over the years.

      13
      1
  11. Ron Ebanks says:

    Oh my god I thought it was all 19 politicians that had missed the seminar , but how would they want to skip out on such an important class, can’t teach them anything about corruption .Did they write the book ?

    21
    3
  12. Anonymous says:

    It would seem obvious that dot gov.ky would be reserved for people commissioned to work for the sitting government. Not alumnus, ex-employees, and opposition members. Then again, on LA site, Miller is still listed as Leader of Opp, and McKeeva still listed as a Dr!

    33
    2

Leave a Reply to L.D. Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.