Politicians resisting anti-corruption reforms
Published:Tuesday | February 8, 2022 | 12:07 AM
The Integrity Commission (IC) has suggested that Jamaica’s 2021 Corruption Perception Index (CPI) score from Transparency International (TI) has stagnated as a result of strong resistance to anti-corruption reform from many political figures.
In its 2021 release of the CPI scores, TI said, “Jamaica has been struggling for several years. It has made some progress – the establishment of the Major Organized Crime and Anti-Corruption Agency as an independent body and the corruption cases recently pursued by the Auditor General’s Department are two examples – but this comes alongside significant resistance to (anti-corruption) reforms from many politicians in the country.”
On January 25, TI released its 2021 CPI, revealing that Jamaica had fallen one place, from 69 out of 180 countries, to 70 out of 180 countries. Jamaica’s 2020 CPI score of 44 out of 100, where zero means ‘highly corrupt’ and 100 ‘very clean’, remained unchanged for 2021.
According to the IC, the only reason that can be discerned for TI’s refusal to elevate Jamaica’s 2021 CPI score is the sole public remarks that it has made about Jamaica in its report.
LITTLE OR NO AVAIL
The IC said it has advanced repeated recommendations for revisions to be made to Jamaica’s anti-corruption legislative and policy frameworks but to little or no avail.
The anti-corruption watchdog says recommendations have been made in its three annual reports to Parliament, in its routine investigation reports, as well as in its special position papers, two of which were recently tabled in Parliament before the Integrity Commission Parliamentary Oversight Committee.
It should not go unnoticed, either, that it was during the commission’s most recent appearance before the Parliament Oversight Committee, that its executive director, Greg Christie, had intimated that a failure to heed the commission’s recommendations could adversely impact Jamaica’s standings in the global corruption perception rankings.
The commission is of the view that, if its recommendations are implemented, the organisation and the country will be in a better position to advance the effectiveness of the fight against the scourge of corruption that appears to have placed the country in a vice grip.
“It is important to note that the making of these recommendations is among the commission’s expressed functions, as mandated by Parliament itself. The commission, therefore, has a duty to make them and the Parliament, it is assumed, in turn, a corresponding obligation to give them serious and timely consideration with a view to implementing them,” the anti-corruption body stated.
In the 20 years that TI has been ranking Jamaica, the country has averaged a CPI of only 37.8 out of 100. A CPI score of below 50 means that a country has a serious corruption problem. This, TI says, is characterised by prevalent bribery, lack of punishment for corruption, as well as public institutions that do not respond to citizens’ needs. Jamaica has been firmly planted in this category for two decades.