Editorial | Mr Chuck is wrong

Justice Minister Delroy Chuck has it wrong. The Integrity Commission (IC) isn’t, and wasn’t, intended to be, implicitly or otherwise, the Government’s public relations agency on corruption prevention.

Any attempt to make it one must be resisted. Parliament must reject any suggestion aimed at preventing the IC, in its annual reports, from disclosing the categories of offences and the classes of public officials referred by its Information and Complaints Division to its director of investigations for probes of possible breaches of the law. The way to lessen public perception of corruption in Jamaica is not by administrative or legislative sleight of hand, but by lessening the reality of corruption.

Further, Mr Chuck should appreciate that while convictions in corruption cases may indeed be part of the matrix in assessing the success of the IC, they are not the only measure in evaluating the agency’s performance. The IC doesn’t stand on its own; it is also a support institution to other agencies of government in their protection of taxpayers’ interests.

Indeed, even where material breaches of good behaviour may be uncovered by the IC in its investigations, not all misconduct reaches the threshold of criminal conduct or falls within the ambit of the legislation over which the commission has prosecutorial authority. In that event, a matter that provides cause for concern may not be forwarded to, or acted on by, the agency’s director of corruption prosecution.

In fact, the law requires that where the director of investigations has “reasonable grounds for suspecting” that there has been a “breach of any code of conduct by any public official or parliamentarian”, he must advise the commissioners and, in the case of a public official, refer the findings to “the relevant public body for appropriate action”.

In the case of parliamentarians, the matter should be referred to “the Speaker of the House of Representatives or the President of the Senate, as the case may require”.

CONTEXT IS IMPORTANT

These issues relating to the transparency with which the IC performs its job, and how the agency’s effectiveness ought to be assessed, returned to the IC’s parliamentary oversight committee last week, where Mr Chuck made another of his periodic swipes at the commission, framed in the context of its efficacy and of ensuring that taxpayers get a reasonable return on their investment. That return, Mr Chuck suggested, would be reflected in a better score, or an improvement in Jamaica’s ranking on Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI).

The proximate trigger for Minister Chuck’s concern was the IC’s disclosure in its annual reports to Parliament of the number and categories of offences, and the classes of public officials to whom they relate, in matters for which its Information and Complaints Division requested deeper probes. That is broadly in keeping with the requirements of the legislation regarding the kind of information that should be included in annual reports.

Mr Chuck’s disquiet was apparently driven by two issues: his perception that there was an undue focus on politicians, and that, often, nothing came of the investigations.

“Oftentimes, you speculate, or effectively speculate that things are happening,” Mr Chuck said. “... A good example (is the report’s disclosure of) persons being investigated for whatever ... say six of 13 parliamentarians.”

He added: “Would it make sense for you to complete the investigation and say this person has been charged or will be charged? Because, you know, when you put in a report that so many persons are being investigated ... it raises the perception rather than the reality that there is corruption out there (although) you are still investigating.”

In the end, Mr Chuck noted, those investigations might conclude without charges, while their inclusion in reports may increase the perception of corruption in Jamaica. He implied that this may contribute to lowering Jamaica’s ranking in international corruption indices.

DECLARED COMMITMENT

To be fair to Mr Chuck, he declared his interest in, and commitment to, the IC identifying and prosecuting corruption, but argued that the commission’s mandate included helping “to improve our rankings in terms of corruption in the country”.

First, the IC is prevented from announcing or speaking about its corruption-related investigations until reports are tabled in Parliament. Its annual reports provide general data.

Second, it is not only the category of parliamentarians that is highlighted in the annual reports. So, too, are public officials. But perhaps the deeper cause of Mr Chuck’s concern is the politics that has surrounded these disclosures. The political Opposition has insisted that none of its parliamentarians were the subjects of investigations for illicit corruption highlighted in the reports in recent years.

Parliament can change the law preventing the IC from placing the information that offends Mr Chuck in its reports. That would be a bad idea. It would expand darkness rather than light.

BETTER RESPONSE

Rather than being overly worried about “the bad impression” the information leaves of Jamaica, or the size of the IC’s budget and the number of corruption prosecutions arising therefrom, Mr Chuck’s emphasis should be on ensuring that public officials and government ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) operate in ways that obviate such an impression.

Further, as a corollary to this matter, The Gleaner recommends that the IC produce a special report tabulating the recommendations it has made to MDAs in investigative reports since its inception, as a consequence of infractions by public officials, and how many of these recommendations have been implemented or otherwise acted on. Matters forwarded to other investigative agencies should also be covered in this report.