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A Swollen, Bureaucratic Monster Is Managing Palestinian Affairs

(Ha'aretz) Meron Benvenisti - The PA has no less than 27 ministries. Each ministry has a minister and a deputy minister, and each has regional offices in addition to the main one. There are a total of 114 regional offices in the West Bank and Gaza. In addition, there are 14 district governors, each with his own offices. The administrative structure is designed to create a large number of jobs and to hand out favors. Rational considerations such as efficiency certainly did not determine that the Ministry of Education and Higher Education be separate from the Ministry of Culture and Art, as well as from the Ministry of Youth and Sport. Each one of these has several directors-general and separate district offices, of course. Public relations are very popular in the PA: In addition to the Special Ministry of Information (which has a minister, deputy minister, advisers, five directors-general and five district offices), Chairman Abbas also has three informational divisions of his own: public relations, foreign information, and a department for the Arabic press and local media. Information technology merits two ministries. In addition to the ministries are dozens of "agencies, institutions, authorities, and councils," each one employing dozens of bureaucrats. The security forces comprise ten different organizations, including the naval police. Within this bureaucratic apparatus, average salaries are about two-thirds higher than the national average.
2006-05-05 00:00:00
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