Daniel Thwaites | Promote Dirks and dash weh de loafers!

Dirk Harrison ought to be promoted. It’s the commissioners who need to be paid out and sent home. Because here we have five nice and decent people who, mysteriously, when put together, have stewed up a foul brew.

For safety’s sake, let me spend a little time to ensure that my comments aren’t used to throw shade on any of the commissars in their individual capacities. I mean, each one has a good reputation. But just like how my machete, which has an unimpeachable and excellent reputation for cutting, is quite useless when it comes to digging holes, so it is here.

Pamela Monroe Ellis, the auditor general, for example, is without reproach. Same for Justice Harrison and Dr McCoy. But something is going very wrong in the combination of these otherwise good elements, and we have to call it for what it is.

Actually, now that I think on the problem, it’s not so uncommon that things which are otherwise quite good by themselves just don’t work out when they’re combined. Think about bleach and ammonia. Nothing wrong with bleach. Nothing wrong with ammonia. But if you put them together: TROUBLE!

Think of water and electricity, if you can remember having either, since neither is in steady supply nowadays. Nothing wrong with water. Nothing wrong with electricity. But if you put them together: SHOCKING!

Same thing with babies and electrical outlets. Nothing wrong with a baby. Nothing wrong with electrical outlets. But you put them together and it’s trips to the hospital, accusations of negligence, and me saying “sorry” over and over and over again. My God, man! Dem gwaan like you is the first person to make a likkle mistake and get distracted. Get me?

Sometimes good things together just don’t work out. Trust me, I could go on and on about this.

Alcohol and driving. Both fun. But apparently not so good together. Weed and math exams. Confusing. Money and women. Same ting. First dates and politics. Avoid. Jerk pork and heavy petting. Burningly disruptive. Idiots and religion. Tedious. Viagra and funeral attendance. Long, sad story. Wifey and side-chick. Hubby and side-man. Smh! That’s back to bleach and ammonia.

What I’m saying: it’s not (necessarily) a comment on the individuals that compose the Integrity Commissioners when I say that collectively they’re doing an exceptionally poor job and it’s just not working. In fact, we need to wheel and come again.

WENT COLLECTIVELY MAD

Now to this Rooms on the Beach mess. Credible sources assure me that the buildings weren’t worth that much, but that the land in the deal was very valuable. So it is at least arguable that, as happens in a negotiation, a discounted price for that portion was appropriate in the interest of getting an investment going. Arrrrrrrguably. Lemme say it again: “Arrrrrrguably”.

However, it seems pretty clear that it was an intervening minister that set the price, not the Urban Development Corporation (UDC), which is a tremendous red flag. Further, there’s the problem of the beach. A whole beach just get giwweh in the transaction and that part is inexplicable and inexcusable. And in all the hullaballoo, suitably muted by the perfectly timed SOE, has there been an explanation of the giwweh beach? I didn’t hear it.

But I’m not commenting on the deal so much as on how the members of the Integrity Commission have clearly sharpened their machetes and attempted to decapitate Dirk Harrison, the former contractor general. This is a shame, because Harrison, following in the illustrious footsteps of Greg Christie, had really done a magnificent job of energising the Contractor General’s Office and making it more nimble, investigative, productive, public, and forceful.

Then in an act of stunning legerdemain, the Government shut it down, and ‘promoted’ Harrison into near-irrelevance. The Gleaner’s editorial aptly titled ‘Parties colluded to impair integrity act’, is accurate in every jot and tittle. The political class protected itself by removing the right of the commission to announce if an investigation has commenced, and has left the timing for the tabling of reports up to the administration.

You understand? Is one bag ah tings dem put in to abort and stitch-up and hedge-up the new culture of transparency that was emerging.

On top of that, the new commissars have added their own personal touch to this mess. Instead of using their discretion to advance transparency and accountability, they’ve joined the cause in the opposite direction. Who, after all, is responsible for the unprecedented and incorrect decision to allow the subjects of an investigation, all of whom had ample opportunity to give evidence and respond to queries, to review and comment on the report after it’s produced but before it is published?

And who thought it was appropriate to publish a cover letter disowning the report coming out of their own commission? Ladies and gentlemen, we must conclude that the good commissars were served mad-puss-JB instead of mint tea and went collectively mad.

JOKE TING NOW

Fact is, the Integrity Commission is a joke ting now. That’s why I say, promote Dirks and dash weh de loafers.

Dirk is a proven quantity. He was a pain in the arse and existential threat to the corrupt elements of the former PNP administration, and he is the same now to this JLP administration. An examination of his track record establishes his impartiality beyond any question.

Jamaica needs him and his Contractor General’s Office back up and running. No wonder the IMF has taken the unprecedented step of highlighting governance issues in their last review. It’s almost as if they’re saying that all the right fiscal numbers won’t produce the results we want if the governance remains crap-poor. Wait … they ARE saying that.

Quick reminder: this same Integrity Commission is sitting on a problem of over 150,000 unfiled integrity reports from public servants, and not one prosecution has proceeded.

So this ‘Rooms on the Beach’ report is another perfect illustration of the malaise. And instead of giving Dirk cover and support, the Integrity Commission threw him under the bus, reversed the bus over Dirk’s shiny bald-head, then drop de engine pon him for good measure. What a piece a wikkidniss!

This was no small slip-up. It is confirmation that the whole Integrity Commission regime is a farce, that the commissars must be relieved of this duty they’re mishandling, and that the ‘Integrity Act’ needs a substantial overhaul.

- Daniel Thwaites is an attorney-at-law. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com.