Editorial | Questions for GG, IC

Now that Sir Patrick Allen is ready to proceed with the instruments of appointment for two critical jobs at the Integrity Commission (IC), the agency can, on its face, proceed with the important work that it was established to do.

But, frankly, this doesn’t resolve the questions the dispute has raised around the operations for IC and the status/independence of its commissioners, once they are appointed. For the governor general’s explanation on Thursday of his delay of what should have been the legal formality of approving the installation of the commissioners’ choice for executive director and a director of corruption prosecutions suggests that Sir Patrick expects, and may have previously been afforded, if not a say, greater courtesies in these matters.

In the circumstances, the governor general and the Integrity Commission’s still relatively new chairman, retired judge Carol Lawrence-Beswick, need to provide additional particulars, and greater clarity, on Sir Patrick’s declaration that the commissioners subsequently adhered to “administrative precedent”, which seems to have cleared the way for the governor general to proceed with the appointments.

In the circumstances, many Jamaicans will insist on reassurance of the operational independence of the IC, and that the constitution and law, until they are changed by Parliament, remain paramount in this regard.

Sir Patrick should at the same indicate what, if any, connections are there between his posture on these appointments and his unusual – and perhaps unprecedented for a Jamaican governor general – submission in June to the parliamentary committee reviewing the Integrity Commission Act, in which he raised concerns about the supposed “ambiguity in leadership authority” at the IC.

The Integrity Commission is an important anti-corruption agency, to which legislators and key public officials annually file income, assets and liability reports. The aim is to ensure that their wealth tracks their known source of legitimate income. The IC also investigates other areas of corruption relating to government contracts.

SHARP ATTACKS

But the eight-year-old agency has in recent times faced sharp attacks from government legislators peeved with some of its investigations and reports, including one against Prime Minister Dr Andrew Holness, who is challenging the IC’s report in court.

The commission’s saga with the governor general results from vacancies opened several months ago with the departure of a number of its top officials whose contracts had came to an end.

While it is the governor general who, at his own discretion, appoints the four of the five IC commissioners (the fifth, the auditor general, is an ex officio member), it is the commissioners who select its staff, including the directors. The law bounds the governor general to approving the IC’s picks to head the commission’s various divisions. Additionally, the act also allows the commissioners to make acting appointments to the directors’ posts for up to three months.

It emerged that the commissioners made recommendations for full appointments to the corruption prosecutor’s and executive director’s jobs in June and July, respectively. This was sufficient time for the appointments to be confirmed when the three-month acting period of the persons holding the posts expired.

However, Sir Patrick appeared to delay issuing the formal instruments, apparently peeved at how the Justice Lawrence-Beswick-led commission had handled the process. He sought legal advice on the matter, King’s House, the governor general’s office, disclosed.

According to the King’s House statement on Thursday, the recommendations for the prosecutor’s and executive director’s positions “departed from the long-established precedent governing appointments”.

“After the commission refuted efforts to resolve the matter, His Excellency sought an opinion from the attorney general’s chambers to ensure that his actions were consistent with constitutional propriety,” it said.

DIDN’T EXPLAIN

Sir Patrick didn’t explain how the approach to appointments under Justice Lawrence-Beswick departed from that of her predecessors, justices Seymour Panton and Karl Harrison.

King’s House, however, said that the opinion from the attorney general’s chambers was shared with the IC, which then “complied with the administrative precedent”.

What does that mean, or imply?

Earlier this year, officials of the governing Jamaica Labour Party complained to the IC over the appointment of Roneiph Lawrence to act as the commission’s prosecutor, ostensibly because of a friendship with Dayton Campbell, general secretary of the opposition People’s National Party. Justice Lawrence-Beswick rejected the basis of the complaint and its lack of ‘cogency’.

But, in his June submission to the committee reviewing the law governing the commission, Sir Patrick complained that he had received no formal notification of Roneiph Lawrence’s acting appointment. He believed he should have.

He also highlighted what he saw as structural deficiencies at the IC where (which is set out in the law) the executive director is in charge of the day-to-day operations of the office while the directors report to the commissioners on the critical aspects of their jobs.

There seems to be a clear nexus between the governor’s highly unusual assertion of himself in the legislative work of Parliament and his recent frictions with the IC.