It has been more than a week since the Gleaner rapped Messrs Dwight Sibblies, Robert Miller and Heroy Clarke for being involved in pedantry against the office of the Auditor-General and, in particular, Pamela Monroe Ellis. Deputy speaker of the House, Juliet Holness, has come out in defence of the three. The Gleaner has not bought the argument of the Prime Minister’s wife, and have stuck to their guns regarding the nature of questioning from Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC).   

Published May 28, 2021

Mrs Holness slew a straw giant

JULIET HOLNESS slew a giant, one made of straw, which she fashioned herself. In her joust, Mrs Holness cast herself as knight protector of the people’s interest, engaged in great acts of chivalry “to ensure the highest level of probity” in government affairs. But unlike Don Quixote and his windmills, she knew her giant was of straw. And perchance there was delusion, it would not have mattered to her, and Jamaica Labour Party’s Sancho Panzas on Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC). She gave them a wide frock of apparent credibility behind which to hide.

Like Mrs Holness, who is the deputy speaker of the House and wife of Prime Minister Andrew Holness, this newspaper does not believe that the auditor general, Pamela Monroe Ellis, is beyond scrutiny or review. Indeed, we expected that she would be subject to sensible, and mature, questioning on the matters raised in an audit of the office of the auditor general by finance ministry officials.

Instead, Mrs Monroe Ellis faced a mob assault from the Jamaica Labour Party members of the PAC, on relatively minor matters flagged by the finance ministry’s audit. The impression created by Dwight Sibblies, Robert Miller and Heroy Clarke et al, was of a high Inquisition, leading to political pogrom against Mrs Monroe Ellis and her office. Stated differently, the obvious intent was to undermine Mrs Monroe Ellis’ credibility, which, in turn, would weaken her several reports on government ministries and departments that unearthed cronyism and corruption and proved embarrassing to the administration and the governing party.

For several hours, over two sittings of the PAC, there were no specific questions on the audit findings, although Mrs Monroe Ellis, having acknowledged her accountability to the people of Jamaica, made it clear that it was she who had asked to appear before the committee because “I have nothing to hide”.

Instead, Mr Sibblies whinged over the fact that Mrs Monroe Ellis, who has two deputy auditors general and four other very senior managers in her office, for not herself being at an exit meeting with the finance ministry auditors a year earlier. He and Mr Miller wanted to know her whereabouts at the time. Then they complained that that information had been reported by The Gleaner before Mrs Monroe Ellis had returned to the committee with the information, having checked her diaries and other relevant documents.

It transpired that Mrs Monroe Ellis was at Parliament for a meeting of the PAC (Messrs Sibblies and Miller had not yet entered the House), which was cancelled at the last moment. The Gleaner was able to ascertain and report this because the newspaper enquired of Parliament. But Mr Miller asked Mrs Monroe Ellis if she had spoken to a journalist. Having confirmed being asked about, and the date of the exit interview, he demanded to know the name of the reporter. She declined.

So farcical and ridiculous this affair became that there was also a question about qualifications. But the absurdity grew even more. Heroy Clarke seemed genuinely flummoxed and uncomprehending at the constitutionally derived independence of the auditor general. He asserted that Parliament was the “highest court” in the land, so members were entitled to answers when they demanded them. The clear intent of the group was to find some flaw, failure of accountability or act of impropriety to pin on Mrs Monroe Ellis and her office.

As we warned before, beyond the mirthless comedy of Messrs Sibblies, Miller and Clarke et al, the danger of the episode is the risk it posed to two critical institutions of oversight – the PAC itself, and the auditor general not being taken seriously. That is bad for good governance.

Mrs Holness would have done better if she had merely apologised for adolescent immaturity of les enfants terribles, rather than attempting to parley the colleagues’ juvenile display as a high-minded attempt at “guarding integrity”. That, like her straw giant, is a myth. 

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