‘They have something to hide’

WESTERN BUREAU:

Six months after the Integrity Commission announced that six parliamentarians are under investigation for alleged illicit enrichment, Opposition Leader Mark Golding is freshly taking the Government to task for not identifying those individuals to date.

Addressing People’s National Party [PNP] supporters at a meeting held at The Manning’s School in Savanna-la-Mar, Westmoreland, where the party’s candidates for local and general elections in that parish were formally presented, Golding declared that his administration will be forthcoming and abide by the law, if it should form the next Government.

“When you take a stock, the Integrity Commission has said there are six members of parliament who are under investigation for illicit enrichment. I have called on the prime minister [Andrew Holness], I have called on the Jamaica Labour Party [JLP], to tell the people who are those persons, who are these people in the Parliament who are under investigation for the serious crime of illicit enrichment,” Golding told the meeting.

“They put a gag order on their own cabinet, forbidding them to talk about Integrity Commission issues. They have something to hide, clearly. Only people who have something to hide behave in that way,” Golding added.

“Jamaica needs a government that the people can have trust and confidence in, a government that is not here to take the people’s resources and give it to their friends and cronies, a government that will lead with integrity … and I can assure you and the Jamaican people that the next PNP government will be a government that plays by the rules.”

UNLAWFUL ENRICHMENT

Last year July, the Integrity Commission announced that six parliamentarians, so far unnamed, had come under investigation for unlawfully enriching themselves.

Section 14 (5) (a) and (b) of the Corruption Prevention Act states that illicit enrichment happens where a public servant owns assets disproportionate to his or her lawful earnings.

Both the ruling JLP and the PNP have said that there is no indication any of their members are being investigated under that charge. The Opposition has made multiple calls for the Government to say who the six parliamentarians are, a demand that has yet to be fulfilled.

Golding also took fresh aim at Holness for his failure to have his statutory deductions for 2021 and 2022 certified.

The Integrity Commission is mandated by law to give an annual publication summarising the statutory declarations of the prime minister and the leader of the Opposition in the Jamaica Gazette.

“How can we have a situation in this country where the annual declaration of assets and liabilities and incomes of the prime minister cannot be certified by the Integrity Commission for two years? How can that be? The prime minister has not spoken to the people and explained what is the problem why his declarations cannot be certified,” said Golding. “I think he said he does not know, [but] how can that be when he is in dialogue with the Integrity Commission about those issues?”

Last November, Holness expressed hope that the issue of his statutory deductions would soon be resolved, and that he has been in dialogue with the Integrity Commission to that effect.

That statement came after Golding accused the media of not giving enough attention to Holness’ failure to have his 2021 and 2022 statutory declarations publicised.

christopher.thomas@gleanerjm.com