From left, Shaw, Wehby and Nelson.

MINISTERS WITHOUT portfolio in the Ministry of Finance and the Public Service, Don Wehby and Dwight Nelson, have been given the charge to manage the country's macroeconomic programme, at least in the short term, until portfolio minister Audley Shaw returns from a few days' rest.

Prime Minister Bruce Golding told journalists in an interview yesterday that both ministers would report directly to him.

Golding said that Shaw would be off for a week and was expected to return to the job shortly.

Negative results

The minister fainted Wednesday and had to be rushed to hospital, where he was admitted for two days. He was later released after a battery of tests produced negative results.

Reporters also quizzed Golding about Shaw's recent comments in Parliament. Shaw had said that the financial crisis in the United States would not seriously affect Jamaica, noting that the domestic financial institutions had suffered only minimal setbacks.

The finance and public service minister also told parliamentarians on September 30 that he did not expect a major fallout in earnings from tourism or remittances.

But Golding insisted yesterday that Shaw had been "misrepresented or misunderstood" when he made his presentation in Gordon House.

He said the minister was speaking specifically in relation to the financial institutions.

"There is no economy in the world that is not going to be affected. This thing is a tsunami. It is the worst global crisis we have seen since the Great Depression of 1929, and it is not over yet," he said.

The prime minister said the current financial meltdown was being monitored daily and Jamaica would carry out a full assessment once the "storm" had passed.

Before year end

In terms of the tabling of the supplementary estimates, Golding said this would be done before year end.

Meanwhile, the prime minister has made it clear that Jamaica's financial institutions are strong and he does not expect to see failures in the banking system.

"We are not going to have the sort of cataclysmic events that have been taking place in other parts of the world," he said.

However, he conceded that the economic climate that now existed would not allow the administration to achieve some of the targets initially projected.