‘Piercingly deafening’

The public silence of Prime Minister Andrew Holness and Opposition Leader Mark Golding on the Integrity Commission’s (IC) report on two former security ministers, Robert Montague and Peter Bunting, granting gun licences under controversial circumstances is being criticised by the country’s leading anti-corruption lobbies.

The attention has turned particularly on Golding, to whom Senator Bunting is a very close ally.

Montague has since resigned from the Cabinet but the People’s National Party (PNP) is insisting that there is no need for any action against Bunting based on the decisions involving Bunting that were highlighted in the IC’s report.

The Jamaica Accountability Meter Portal (JAMP), the National Integrity Action (NIA) and rights group Jamaicans for Justice (JFJ) are demanding that public officials named in the IC’s report be relieved of some of their official roles.

“The decisions were made in the proper exercise of his ministerial authority, considering the facts before him, and the recommendations of the review panel,” the PNP said in a statement yesterday afternoon.

It added: “there is no question of the two decisions being in any manner tainted by corruption or improper motive. There is nothing that has come to light that suggests that the decisions were flawed or improper, and we are guided by due process”.

The PNP release also noted that Bunting’s March statement outlined the facts of the two cases involving him.

Of the two cases, one related to his approval of a firearm licence for a man whose drug conviction in the US was expunged, and the other involved a man who was accused of molesting his wife’s relative and who also had two assault charges – one dismissed and the other made no order.

“The Firearm Review Board had recommended that the licences be granted or restored, and as minister I acted either in accordance with their recommendations, or more conservatively,” Bunting said, adding that media coverage concerning him has been defamatory, as the contents of the IC’s report do not support the headlines and other statements in the media.

He also argued that when a criminal record is expunged, the law requires that that person must be treated as if the crime had not occurred.

Bunting said there are very few exceptions to that rule, and none of them applied in the case he ruled on.

‘NOT GOOD ENOUGH’

Jeanette Calder, the executive director of JAMP, said the silence of the two political leaders, four days after the report was tabled in Parliament, is “piercingly deafening”.

She said the acceptance of the resignation from Montague, while an action, is “not good enough” as it is not a statement nor a preliminary comment on the concerns Holness’ administration has “for a report that has been very painful for Jamaicans at home and abroad to read”.

As it relates to Bunting, Calder told The Sunday Gleaner, “Bunting has made his case but what are Jamaicans to make of the silence of Mr Golding, his leader. This has left a voluminous space for Jamaicans to fill and interpret the silence and understandably, their translation does not spell good and indeed it is not good enough.”

Professor Trevor Munroe, the principal director of NIA, said the key findings of the IC’s report relating to Bunting “do not appear to rise to the same level of gravity as those concerning Minister Montague”.

“Nevertheless, the PNP and/or ex-Minister Bunting need to provide a more fulsome response to the IC’s adverse finding, especially since the report does not indicate that ex-Minister Bunting, unlike Minister Montague, was interviewed by the Integrity Commission regarding his approval of the licences concerned,” Munroe said.

JFJ, meanwhile, said the Opposition leader should ask Bunting to relinquish his official duties as party spokesman and leader of opposition business in the Senate pending further investigations.

The group also said Holness should make fundamental changes to the operations of the Firearm Licensing Authority (FLA) to demonstrate seriousness in tackling corruption.

“JFJ lambasts the Government for what can only be described as ‘state-sanctioned criminality’ where public officials are alleged to be involved in issuing gun permits to known criminals. JFJ contends that the stink of corruption that plagues the FLA must end. Unsavoury acts by public officials, as described in the Commission’s report, undermine their ‘moral authority’ to effect crime-fighting measures,” the rights group said in a statement.

The Office of the Prime Minister announced on February 24 that adjustments to the operations of the FLA, following public comments from the agency’s head Shane Dalling that month, are being considered by the National Security Council.

The IC also said it has received allegations concerning acts of abuse of power and corruption committed by Dalling at the FLA. However, the report did not address those matters.

“The fact that there are allegations made about me and the Integrity Commission has not made a finding or conclusion on it may mean that there was no substance to the allegations but that is for the Integrity Commission to make a conclusion or finding on,” Dalling said on Friday.

He said he has not heard from the Financial Investigations Division and the Major Organised Crime and Anti-Corruption Agency, the two agencies the IC said it has referred allegations it received but did not fall within its remit.

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