PNP contributing to mistrust of Integrity Commission - Spence

By Kimone Witter   

 

Political commentator Dr. Nadeen Spence has chastised members of the People's National Party for adding to the public mistrust of the Integrity Commission through their pronouncements on investigations involving parliamentarians.

 

Dr. Spence says the PNP has added its interpretation of information from the anti-corruption body and packaged it for political gain.

 

Two issues which have been occupying the political and public space have been the investigation into allegations of illicit enrichment of eight parliamentarians as well as the outstanding statutory declarations of Prime Minister Andrew Holness.

 

Dr. Spence's comments follow the widespread speculation among the public about a report the Integrity Commission submitted to Parliament last week for tabling.

 

Speaking Wednesday on the Morning Agenda on Power 106, Dr. Spence lamented that the public now has a biased view of investigations of the Integrity Commission. 

 

"As a nation, we were done an injustice, yeah. We were not able to really imbibe the information in a way that would allow us the way the commission intended for us to take in the information," she complained, adding that the country is now at a point where "we are having all kinds of interpretations of the information, and people don't know what to believe or who to trust".   

 

She argued that the Integrity Commission has "suffered dreadfully" as a result of the way the situation has played out. 

 

The alleged contents of the yet to be tabled report were aired by a media house on Monday.

 

The Integrity Commission subsequently issued a statement warning the public and the media that it is a breach of the Integrity Commission Act to report or make any public statement on an untabled investigation report. 

 

But Dr. Spence believes the Integrity Commission should go beyond issuing a press release on the leaked report and conduct an internal investigation to find those releasing information that should not yet be in the public domain. 

 

She has also recommended that the Joint Select Committee reviewing the Integrity Commission Act consider amending the necessary sections of the legislation to prevent future discourse of this nature.

 

Still, Dr. Spence contended that the commission is not without blame in submitting the report while Parliament is on recess. 

 

"It should have looked at the political situation and said, 'You know what? Parliament is on a break. We cannot table this report at this time, given the public sentiment and given what has been unfolding over these last couple years. So let us table it at a point where it can lend clarity to what is happening.' But it didn't do that."

 

The commentator also suggested that Parliament could have been reconvened earlier to allow for fulsome discussion on the contents of the report.