Dwayne Vernon | NaRRA: Hubris on the waterfront

The ancient Greeks had a word for the moment a powerful man starts believing his own press releases: hubris. They also had a word for what comes next: nemesis. Between the two lies a long history of clever people tripping over their own cleverness.

Icarus was warned about the sun and flew higher. Richard Nixon taped himself for posterity and preserved his cover-up instead. Al Capone ran Chicago then fell over unpaid taxes because who would dare audit Capone? Every cartoon villain explains the plan just before the trapdoor opens. Arrogance is the most reliable whistle-blower ever invented. The truly dangerous schemer is quiet and modest. Power rarely produces that type. It produces the kind that cannot resist a waterfront lease.

On paper, the National Reconstruction and Resilience Authority’s objectives are hard to argue with. Hurricane Melissa tore through western Jamaica in October 2025, leaving US$12.2 billion in damage. It promised coordination, an end to red tape, resilient rebuilding, and private investment. No one disputes that the west must rebuild faster.

But objectives are words. Design is intent. A properly designed NaRRA would look different.

PROPER DESIGN

A properly designed authority would have a statutory board. NaRRA has none. Its chief executive is appointed by, and reports to, the prime minister. A properly designed authority would welcome sunlight. The act, as described in Parliament, gags officials under threat of criminal penalty then indemnifies them for what they do. A properly designed authority would respect regulators. NaRRA can issue directives to them, and the minister can override them outright, “notwithstanding” any other law. A properly designed authority would focus on the hurricane zone. NaRRA’s headline projects are a new Kingston Public Hospital, Vernamfield airport, a Port of Kingston logistics hub, and a government campus at Heroes Circle. None is in the west.

The old saying still holds: power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Power concentrated: planning, approvals, procurement, and building under one roof. Power unbounded: a minister who can grant approvals himself and an authority allowed to do “anything” it deems necessary. Power unwatched: no board, secrecy clauses, legal immunity, and an oversight committee picked by those it should watch. Corruption, simply, is the abuse of entrusted power for private gain. The Jamaican people own this money. NaRRA hands the managers the keys, the cheque book and a blindfold for the owners.

THE WARNING SIGNS

The biggest corruption rarely looks like a brown envelope; it looks legal on paper and works by making regulators toothless. NaRRA makes regulators optional. Corrupt systems love big projects because big projects hide big kickbacks while drains, culverts, and farm roads starve. NaRRA’s wish list is airports, ports, and office campuses. Speed is the oldest excuse. Cutting corners never made a government faster, only more expensive. Information arrives only under pressure: the CEO’s J$40 million salary, plus a 25 per cent gratuity, surfaced through an Access to Information request. The CEO’s job was advertised in January 2026, two months before Parliament saw the bill. The decision came first. The law was paperwork.

Then came the rent. On top of an exorbitant salary for its CEO, NaRRA signed for two floors of the Digicel building on the Kingston waterfront: five years, about J$115 million a year, for an agency with no completed project. When the public objected, the prime minister called the price “a market reality” and “average”. Retreating, he cut it to one floor, said staff would “have to double up”, and lamented that it was “sad” because the scale-back would affect “the delivery of projects”.

Read that again. Hurricane victims who have waited almost a year were told, in effect, that their complaint would slow their own relief. That is not a servant listening to his employers. By responding this way, the prime minister runs the risk of being viewed as a megalomaniac who sees his projects as monuments to himself or a vindictive narcissist who, when criticised, makes sure critics pay for it. Nemesis does not need an opposition. Hubris supplies its own.

REBUILD THE WEST

None of this means that NaRRA must fail. It means rebuilding it around the people, starting in the west. House the headquarters in a government-owned building, not a leased waterfront office. Make housing the first priority: publish a register of every damaged home in the five western parishes, with a date for repair to a hurricane-resistant code. Equally, focus on schools: repair every damaged school to the same standard so no child in the west loses another term. Rebuild the farm and parochial roads that carry produce, children, and ambulances before any airport is surveyed. Build, in every hard-hit community, a resilient community centre and park: a hardened building that is a hurricane shelter for a few days a year and for the other 360, a community hub, with vending stalls, shared kitchens, Wi-Fi, and space for small businesses. Give NaRRA a board, publish every contract, and let the CEO answer to Parliament every quarter.

The Greeks would know this story: a powerful man, a gilded office, a warning ignored. The ending is still ours to write. Jamaica can demand an authority built for Jamaica rather than for Jamaica House, or it can wait for nemesis, which always arrives, but rarely before the money is gone.

Dwayne Vernon, PhD, is a lecturer in the Department of Government, The University of the West Indies, Mona. The views expressed are his own. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com.