Another nine-day wonder?

 I wonder if that excellent investigation by the Integrity Commission which unearthed the alleged corruption at KSACMC and the top executive at NWC, will cause the Holness administration and its minions to stop harassing/maligning that institution and allow it to do its work in peace!

Or if the spotlight now turned on the corruption at the Building Department of the double-dealing KSACMC will be just a talking point or will something be finally done about that institution that has caused nothing but grief for many struggling homeowners in the corporate area?

Me, hold my breath?

No way.

I am of course referring to the Integrity Commission’s exposure which caused NWC top boss Mark Barnett to be sent on leave by the NWC and now face prosecution.

The 'delinquency' of the Building Department is not new. And it has cost the Municipality, homeowners, and taxpayers, dearly over the decades.

Right now, the spotlight on that department has to do with new developments in upscale areas but the headaches the department caused over the years, have long been visible in places like Richmond Park, Eastwood Park, and Bedford Park.

I resided in Bedford Park for decades, and their refusal to prosecute businesses that operate there illegally caused nothing but frustration for us forever, despite the fact that the breaches were reported ad nauseam. 

Not to mention the unnecessary cost to taxpayers in general. For, the commercialization of residential areas causes the rapid deterioration of the roads which were never built to the standard necessary to withstand commercial activity. So, on the rare occasions when the authorities repair these roads, it’s the general public that has to foot the bill.

Why?  Because “Money talk and bull#&@%** walk!”

That is what the first operator to breach our covenant told residents when he turned his home into a heavy-duty commercial operation and a delegation approached him. And yes, the KSACMC refused to do anything about it, so more and more illegal operators followed suit until the road became almost undrivable. The entire area deteriorated and life became miserable for homeowners despite regular reports to the so-called regulators, the KSACMC.

“Money talk and bull#&@%*...walk.”

As a victim of that corrupt municipality, I know them well. Yup,  and there have been many successive administrations at that sewer pit.

I couldn’t believe it when I recently heard an apologist saying the problem at KSAMC was that they didn’t have the funds to employ enough building inspectors!

Do you know what the penalty for operating businesses in residential areas is? If my memory serves me correctly, it is in the range of $25,000 per day once the infractions continue. And they were always reported and totally visible!

But while the violations continued for all to see, the KSACMC happily gave up that revenue because individuals at the monitoring and enforcing institution were being paid millions not to enforce the laws. So, as the neighborhoods became run down, people who had worked long and hard to own a home had to move out of sheer exasperation.

The unprosecuted violations over the decades elicited an occasional report in instigative journals, but successive administrations would do nothing about the disgraceful and outright corruption at that municipality, so one can only assume they are all complicit!

Now it continues, not only with the commercialization of residential areas but also with rampant building violations in apartment development in areas with large lots.

That’s what the much-maligned Integrity Commission has brought to the fore by the exposing of the NWC boss and “delinquency” at the Municipality.

Will the exposure lead to any cleansing of the stables at KSACMC?

 I doubt it, for we are notorious for our love of nine-day wonders followed by a “bagga mout,” but no action is usually taken.

Many decades ago, it was reported that the late Sir Alexander Bustamante had once disbanded the KSAC because of the entrenched corruption there. After my experience with that institution, as far as I am concerned, the time has long passed for another cleansing there.

If the latest Integrity Commission's Report leads to that action, they will be more than well worth their existence, despite the determination by senior politicians to destroy them.

Scratching each others back!

 

There are two popular concepts that come to mind, whenever I think of Jamaican politics.

They are; you scratch my back and I will scratch yours and the other is honor among thieves. While it was William Shakespeare who popularized the latter in the end of the 1500s in his play Henry IV, Jamaican PNP and JLP politicians have adopted it whole heartedly and been applying it religiously since we got independence sixty years ago.

Yup, we will be celebrating that great event with much fanfare in a few weeks!

In the meantime, the country continues to be impoverished by corruption which is estimated to cost us in excess of $100 billion per year.

Don’t be taken in by what the politicians say about each other from the platforms or in parliament! That is just for show, for when it comes to what most politicians want, ie. the spoils of office, it’s a different ballgame.

In fact, if a being came from Mars, it could be excused for thinking that Jamaica is the least corrupt country in the world, since all over the world it sees reports of politicians being jailed for corruption, but never Jamaica, no matter what the Auditor General finds or how many spots we slide down on the Transparency International Perception of Corruption Index.

I know, people like to point to the late JAG Smith, a former JLP Minister of Labor who was imprisoned in 1990, supposedly for stealing Farm Worker’s money.

BUT HE WAS NOT JAILED FOR CORRUPTION but for being rude and abusive to an influential member of the PNP which then formed the government!

For in true “honor among thieves’ style, the powerful late trade unionist, former prime minister Hugh Lawson Shearer and his bosom friend, the late Michael Manley who was then prime minister, had arranged that it would be swept under the carpet. Unfortunately, Smith’s legendary arrogance caused him to be abusive to the final arbiter on the matter in the PNP government and that is why it was pursued and Smith imprisoned!

In the meantime, our neighbors take corruption so seriously, that on the 8 July 2022, our own Jamaica Observer carried this item on how a former prime minister of Trinidad, allegedly involved in corruption there, is being treated in his country. It says in part “September 2 (2022) the court is to give a ruling to an application by the Deputy Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) George Busby, who has requested an adjournment into the restart of a decades-old preliminary inquiry into corruption charges against former prime minister Basdeo Panday and three others, including his wife, Oma.”

Since there is no penalty in our political system for corruption despite the numerous cases that have been cited publicly over the years, the politicians do as they like and remain untouchable. 

Our legendary corruption is not only widely known in Jamaica but in the neighboring islands, for look at this headline in the St. Kitts and Nevis Observer in 2019; “Jamaica Losing $J100 Billion Annually from Crime, Corruption.”

And yes, we do have a so-called Integrity Commission, but guess what, it is being gagged and deterred from doing its job by guess who? The Jamaican parliamentarians JLP and PNP alike of course. (You scratch my back and I will scratch yours).

This recently led our Financial Investigation Division to say in frustration that ‘the work of agencies of Government in the fight against corruption was being hamstrung by the need to seek ministerial approval before they can exchange information on investigations. The FID said where the Integrity Commission needs to exchange information with designated competent authorities or foreign entities for legitimate investigations, it should not be hindered, and that the Act needs to be amended to remove this stumbling block in the fight against corruption”.

Also, according to reports coming out of parliament last week, when the Integrity Commission Bill was being considered, there was consensus between the Government and the Opposition to curtail the ability of the commission to speak about its investigations until probes were completed and reports tabled in Parliament.

This, despite Justice Panton and numerous other pointing out that;

“The Commission is firmly of the view that this is a serious impediment to good governance.” “... It is clearly ridiculous that whereas the police, quite rightly, can say that they are investigating a criminal matter, the Integrity Commission is not allowed to say it is.”

The politicians remain firmly determined to keep secret whether any of the numerous allegations of corruption, are being investigated, thus preventing members of the public or even whistleblowers from coming forward with information.

So, whereas, the public is often exhorted with these fine words in the interest of fighting crime; ‘If you know something say something,’ that only applies where the alleged criminals are mere plebs, not politicians.

So yes, politicians shout about the corruption from the rooftops, but you scratch my back and I will scratch yours, remains the dominant feature of the Jamaican parliamentary practice.

And the people perish.

 

 

Joan Williams, is a retired talk show host. She can be contacted at; gratestj@gmail.com or followed at; Joan my-views.blogspot.com