Integrity Commission set up to kill OCG probes – Bunting

NEARLY THREE years after the then Office of the Contractor General (OCG) launched a probe into alleged irregularities into the issuing of permits by the Firearm Licensing Authority (FLA), an opposition lawmaker is raising questions about the status of that investigation.

Manchester Central member of parliament and former minister of national security, Peter Bunting, yesterday charged that the Integrity Commission was established “prematurely” to “neuter” critical investigations that were being carried out by the contractor general.

Bunting was debating a motion to establish a committee of Parliament that would provide oversight for the Integrity Commission.

The governance watchdog was established under the Integrity Commission Act, which brought three disparate entities – the Office of the Contractor General, the Corruption Prevention Commission, and the Integrity Commission – under a single anti-corruption oversight body.

“Two-plus years and we still have not got reports. They have not concluded critical investigations like the proper issuing of licences at the Firearm Licensing Authority,” Bunting declared.

“Let the report come forward,” charged Bunting, who engaged in crosstalk with government lawmakers.

In 2017, the OCG started probing the FLA, whose five board members had resigned about two days after its then chairman, Dennis Wright, declared that they were going nowhere over a gun-licence scandal.

Around the same time, it was revealed that the Major Organised Crime and Anti-Corruption Agency was probing more than 100 gun licences that may have been issued to people of questionable character.

HYPOCRISY

However, leader of government business in the House of Representatives, Karl Samuda, rubbished the claims by Bunting that the Integrity Commission was established prematurely. He said that the Opposition had pressed the Government to introduce the law speedily.

“To speak of being premature is nothing short of opportunism and hypocrisy at the highest level,” said Samuda.

Bunting contended that when the minister of justice signed off on the establishment of the Integrity Commission in February 2018, no study was conducted to determine the structure of the new organisation.

He noted that since its inception, there had been resignations of key members of staff, including the former chairman, a commissioner, and a director.

“We have not had a permanent director of corruption prosecutions at the Integrity Commission,” he observed.

In his contribution to the debate, Justice Minister Delroy Chuck suggested that the Parliament establish a single oversight committee to review the work of all commissions of Parliament.

Opposition Leader Dr Peter Phillips disagreed with the suggestion that Parliament set up one committee to provide oversight. He argued that steps had been made in the past to establish a single oversight committee of parliament but it did not “live up to its expectations”.

edmond.campbell@gleanerjm.com