Gov­ern­ment has not an­nounced any new Pub­lic Ad­min­is­tra­tion Min­is­ter yet—but names be­ing tipped in­clude Min­is­ter in Ed­u­ca­tion Dr Lovell Fran­cis.

On Mon­day af­ter Gov­ern­ment at­tempt­ed to ap­point at­tor­ney Garvin Si­mon­ette to the post fol­low­ing the re­vo­ca­tion of Mar­lene Mc­Don­ald’s ap­point­ment, the Prime Min­is­ter had to pull back on that plan since Si­mon­ette de­clined the post due to a DUI charge in Flori­da in 2014.

He al­so re­signed from his ap­point­ment as a PNM sen­a­tor.

Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley took over the Min­istry un­til “new arrange­ments” are made for a Min­is­ter. Fran­cis did not an­swer calls yes­ter­day. He is a for­mer uni­ver­si­ty lec­tur­er and MP for Moru­ga/Table­land.

Mean­while, Row­ley will pre­side over PNM’s screen­ing ex­er­cise this af­ter­noon to se­lect nom­i­nees for Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment seats in the Diego Mar­tin Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion and for ar­eas which still have to get can­di­dates.

These in­clude for the out­stand­ing elec­toral dis­tricts of the San­gre Grande Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion, the Tu­na­puna/Pi­ar­co Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion, and the Port-of-Spain City Cor­po­ra­tion.

Next week Mon­day screen­ing will take place from 5 pm at the PNM’s San Fer­nan­do Re­gion­al Of­fice, for nom­i­nees for all of the elec­toral dis­tricts with­in the Princes Town Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion and the Pe­nal/Debe Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion.

Al­so be­ing screened then will be nom­i­nees for the out­stand­ing elec­toral dis­tricts with­in the Siparia Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion, Point Fortin Bor­ough Cor­po­ra­tion, and the Ma­yaro/Rio Claro Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion.