NIA rejects proposal to remove Auditor General from Integrity Commission

 

National Integrity Action has joined the Chairman of the Integrity Commission in rejecting a proposal to remove the Auditor General from the Integrity Commission.

 

Chairman of the Integrity Commission, retired justice Seymour Panton, said he was surprised by the proposal made by a member of the Parliamentary Oversight Committee reviewing the Integrity Commission Act.

 

Justice Panton said the proposal is unacceptable.

 

In an interview with Radio Jamaica News, NIA founding director Professor Trevor Munroe argued that there is no basis for such a proposal.

 

"The Office of the Auditor General and the particular occupant of that office has been a member of institutions that have been set up to investigate corruption. There's no reason why 50 years later, without any adverse result from the presence of the Auditor General on such a body, that the Auditor General should be removed. What this would do is weaken the capacity of the Integrity Commission," he argued, insisting the proposal should be rejected. 

 

Professor Munroe added that he is troubled by several proposals submitted by government member Everald Warmington before the Joint Select Committee of Parliament, including the proposal where the members of the Commission would be specifically subject to impeachment. 

 

"He also proposed that the Integrity Commission should have no power to investigate or to require information from investigations that were continuing prior to the establishment of the Commission, but in relation to the bodies that were absorbed in the Commission, for example, the Office of the Contractor General. I read it also as part of a proposal to make the members of the Commission vulnerable to charges of defamation by removing parliamentary privilege, which the Commission now enjoys."

 

Professor Munroe contended that the proposals are aimed at weakening the powers of the Integrity Commission.