.png)
00:00
00:00
00:00
Former Political Ombudsman Donna Parchment Brown
By Kimone Witter
Former Political Ombudsman Donna Parchment Brown says the decision to subsume the office into the Electoral Commission of Jamaica was ill-advised.
She is therefore calling for the office of the Political Ombudsman to be reinstated.
In an op-ed in the Sunday Gleaner, Mrs. Parchment Brown said one year after the unilateral enactment of the Political Ombudsman (interim) (Amendment) Act 2024 by the government, the lack of action from the Political Ombudsman Commission to complaints and controversial rhetoric was expected.
The former Political Ombudsman further stated that there would be great admiration for parliamentarians if they admitted that the changes have not worked, repealed the amendment and sought to ensure that a Political Ombudsman is appointed at the earliest possible date with the necessary support.
Speaking Monday on the Morning Agenda on Power 106, Mrs. Parchment Brown said the nine-member Electoral Commission, which comprises four political appointees, has been placed in a difficult position of maintaining neutrality and confidentiality.
"There is a clear conflict of interest even by good decent people. And it's important to say that the integrity of the nine commissioners is in no way being impugned, but one must be rational. You know, people are there, placed there by organisations to represent the interest of the organisation, which for the normal work of the ECJ is very, very beneficial and desirable and has worked to benefit us. Maybe there have been difficulty, but it works.
"But when you now call on those four persons in a potential conflict of interest situation, then not only are you putting the other commissioners also in an insidious position because if they form a view in relation to any matter to be investigated and there is a lot of contention, then it unnecessarily adds discord to the work of the ECJ," she complained.
Mrs. Parchment Brown also raised questions about the status of previous employees of the Office of the Political Ombudsman and whether they were retained or their positions made redundant.
The House of Representatives passed the Political Ombudsman (Amendment) Act, 2024, on February 6 last year.
In a statement to the House, Justice Minister Delroy Chuck said investing the responsibilities of the Ombudsman in the ECJ would result in more impactful recommendations made to political parties or their representatives in circumstances where there had been breaches.
But Mrs. Parchment Brown is calling for the Political Ombudsman Commission to give an account of its work since February last year.
"Have they received complaints? Have they been handled and what is their methodology for handling complaints? Is it that everything goes to all nine [commissioners]? And if not to all nine, then to who? I see absolutely no reason why a single ombudsperson has not been appointed," she insisted.
Several weeks after the enactment of the amended legislation, the Electoral Commission released a statement outlining that complaints of political misconduct can be submitted via an online portal.
The ECJ also indicated that there was a plan to release a mobile application, enabling citizens to submit video recordings of incidents directly from their smartphones.
comments powered by Disqus