Mark Wignall | SSL ate and belched in Bolt’s face

The very essential poison-tipped spear always aimed at a political leader buying into the democratic process is the fear of being voted out and dragging his party along to endure a long winter of opposition.

Up north in the deeply troubled United States, President Donald Trump is term limited, so that is of no import to him. He has openly demonstrated the mentality of an autocrat, and he has begun to acutely express his ambitions with the thirst of a megalomaniac. To fulfil his yawning desire, he is about to destroy the US republic and cede its power to Vladimir Putin. And then he never really liked the sort of people who voted for him, so being cruel to them as he rips apart their daily lives is just another carefree stroll on his nearest golf course.

Here in Jamaica, our political process is sound, stable, and its glitches are hardly earth-shattering. On top of that, neither of our political leaders has demonstrated the behaviour of an autocrat. The ruling Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) has a fraternal relationship with the Republican party in the US, but in the age of Trump, that relationship was not exactly something to boast of.

People’s National Party (PNP) President Mark Golding and Prime Minister (PM) Andrew Holness of the JLP are committed to fully utilising the democratic process to win the next elections. If the JLP wins a third straight term, it is almost certain that Golding will depart the PNP leadership as the JLP heads towards putting in place another term for Holness in about 2030.

The most important factors driving the leadership of both the JLP and the PNP are identifying, isolating, and leading an intense drum roll on a matter that will place the other party in many moments of electoral stress. The matter of Stocks and Securities Limited (SSL) and the significant US dollar-denominated sums purloined from Usain Bolt, Jamaica’s most famous living legend, had the potential to harm the JLP in its march towards securing another term this year.

It went like this. In January 2023, it was reported that a massive fraud had engulfed SSL. Affected in this crooked net was Bolt and US$12 million of his money. Or was it US$6.5 million?

Certainly if $12 million was the cumulative growth on $6.5 million between 2012-2013 and 2023, that would be phenomenal. Based on the economic horror which took place later, the difference in the two numbers is immaterial.

THE BIGGER CONTACTS

After it was determined that a wealth adviser, Jean-Ann Panton, was collared in the fraud, the information flowed into what sensible thought was further determination from the street that she did not act alone. This, of course, was not a case when a lady in the cool confines of a plush office was getting help from the parking lot attendant. No. That assistance would have to be from much higher up the company food chain.

Certainly the JLP must now be looking back, knowing now that at the time in 2013 when Bolt was placing his funds under the management package at SSL, the structure was shaky. We are told that Bolt reported that he had fired the head of the company handling the company which placed the funds.

Think about this. If the Financial Services Commission (FSC) had SSL under the strictest of scrutinies at the very time that Bolt was parting with his funds, even though those matters would be highly confidential, it is the responsibility of a business manager to have his nose into every little whisper and every word written in secret spaces in the jurisdiction he operates and on the global networks. Could that be the cause of the firing?

That aside, certainly the PNP should be driving home the point that the former finance minister, Dr Nigel Clarke, had received FSC info, and according to him, it was not specifically, physically brought to him. And thus, a critically important document was erroneously left in the rabbit cage.

So the FSC would peer into SSL, see the rot but is fully aware of the interplay of psychologies and the dangers of corrective actions leading into a quite intense crash. Certainly, if we can give SSL the benefit of the doubt at the beginning and it was trying desperately to bring its numbers back into safe territory, it also knew that it had the FSC held in a most tender spot. Damned if it did. Damned if it didn’t.

WHAT CAN THE GOVERNMENT DO ABOUT BOLT’S MONEY?

Were I the PM, I would be politically terrified to have any conversation with Bolt. But I would want to show some empathy and engage with him before the PNP does it. I would have to admit my confusion.

Sometime after it was reported that Bolt was a victim of the 2023 SSL fraud, an engineer I knew from the 1980s linked with me, and when we spoke by phone, he was on the verge of crying. He had long divorced. There were no children. He sold his house, bought a one-bedroom flat and lodged US$100,000 in SSL for his pension.

Those who believe that a special dispensation should be made for Bolt and the government should either use taxpayers’ funds or call on the bigwigs in the private sector to bail out Bolt are living in a fool’s paradise.

I think that Usain Bolt, a highly intelligent person, knows that the realities of human nature plus how governments work are not in his favour. And then again, if Bolt was ever bailed out by the taxpayer, would my engineer friend not also have a right to bawl out too for his US$100,000?

Someone needs to occupy the insides of a quite unpleasant prison cell for this wrong, but I suspect that it will be more than one. And remember, as I said, those others who abetted sit higher up in the money tower.

Mark Wignall is a political and public affairs analyst. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and mawigsr@gmail.com.