By Vernon Daley, Staff ReporterAS OF this week the Corruption Prevention Commission will start sending out forms on which specified public servants will be required to file declarations.
The forms will be distributed to ministries, Government departments and statutory
bodies.
Under the Corruption Prevention Act, public servants are given three months
in which to file their declarations after the regulations for the law are gazetted.
The regulations were gazetted on January 31.
As such, public servants have until April 30, to file declarations of their income, assets and liabilities to the anti-corruption body.
David Grey, secretary manager of the Commission, said yesterday that the forms will be accompanied by a letter to senior public sector managers setting out the requirements of the Corruption Prevention Act and its regulations.
In keeping with the regulations, all public servants earning $2 million and above, as well as those who occupy sensitive posts in the public service, will be required to file declarations. All members of the Jamaica Constabulary Force and the Jamaica Defence Force will also be required to file declarations to the Commission.
According to Mr. Grey, the Government departments will be asked to sift through the names of persons who are required to file declarations and notify them as to their responsibility. They will also be required to send a list of those persons to the Commission.
"The Commission will be placing a lot of reliance on the Government departments for self-searching," Mr. Grey said. "They will have to inform their staff". Mr. Grey estimated that there are about 20,000 to 25,000 public servants who will be required to file declarations. He, however, could not say definitely whether members of school boards would be required to file.
"I see no exclusion of them in the law," Mr. Grey said. He added, however, that he would be meeting with chairman of the Commission, retired judge Chester Orr, to discuss the matter early next week.
More than a year ago, there was great outcry from some members of public school boards when it was suggested that they would be required to file declarations to the Commission. At the time, many persons argued that school board members were not public servants and that the act would only serve as a deterrent to persons coming forward and giving public service on such boards.
Meanwhile, there will be an official launch of the Commission by Prime Minister
P.J. Patterson on March 11. There have been several delays in the startup of
the Commission, even though the Corruption Prevention Act was passed some two
years.
The body now has the green light to carry out its work with the recent parliamentary approval of the regulations which will give it operational guidelines.
