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President Mori designates new FSM Insurance Commissioner

Palikir, Pohnpei (FSM Information Services): February 17, 2010 - As previously reported in Press Release #0210-21 entitled "Executive Branch proposes legislation to separate the Banking and Insurance Board", President Mori has submitted legislation to Congress to separate the Board of the Banking and Insurance Commission into two separate Boards, and also have separate Commissioners for each distinct industry. In his efforts to achieve this, he has appointed Mr. Jesse Giltamag to serve as the FSM Insurance Commissioner.

Prior to this appointment, Mr. Giltamag was the Insurance Examiner of the FSM Banking and Insurance office, serving under Mr. Wilson Waguk, the Banking and Insurance Commissioner. With this appointment, Mr. Giltamag takes on as the FSM Insurance Commissioner and Mr. Waguk will serve as the Banking Commissioner.

This separation of commissioners is possible because of Section 203 of Title 37 of the FSM Code which gives the President the authority to appoint a person to be the Insurance Commissioner, who shall be responsible to the Insurance Board, for the execution of its policy and the performance of duties and exercise of powers. Subsection 2 of the same section requires that the Insurance Commissioner shall not hold or occupy any other office unless approved in writing by the President, except that the person appointed to be the Insurance Commissioner may also be appointed to be the Banking Commissioner, as it has been in the past. No legislation is needed to appoint a new Insurance Commissioner.

As for the proposed legislation to separate the Insurance Board from the Banking Board, that measure is still before the 16^th FSM Congress and may not be decided upon during this current session, which ends today. For now, the Banking and Insurance Board will continue to oversee both Banking and Insurance industries.