Editorial | Speaker Charles should now rescind gag order

Now that Prime Minister Andrew Holness has commented extensively, in the House, on the auditor general’s exposition of the governance failures at the Caribbean Maritime University (CMU), and of his administration’s efforts to cover the gaps in its financial management, maybe the Speaker, Pearnel Charles, will lift his gag order on the document’s review by Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC).

For not only does Mr Charles’ ruling, from this newspaper’s perspective, rests on dubious legal authority, it would be a signal of the maturity of Jamaica’s democracy, including, critically, the principle of the separation of powers, if the legislature were allowed to properly get on with its work.

It is within the same context that we suggest to Speaker Charles that he places no undue hurdles to the tabling, and debate, of an opposition’s motion of censure over his behaviour in this affair, which, if that is the attempt, he should be advised to desist. Stifling parliamentary debate, even when it is uncomfortable for the Government, does the administration, and democracy, no good.

The broad outlines of the collapse of the oversight regime at the CMU, and the apparent schemes for kickbacks, graft and cronyism, were already widely known, having been the subjects of hearings before Parliament’s Public Administration and Appropriations Committee (PAAC), and because, as well, of the corruption related charges laid against several individuals, including the former education minister, Ruel Reid, and the university’s president, Fritz Pinnock.

What the auditor general conducted was a detailed analysis of how the place worked, which unearthed the specific instances of the flouting of the Government’s procurement rules, of bidders being given information about other people’s tenders, and a management that appeared to like to host fetes on taxpayers’ bill. And it happened under the noses of a narcoleptic council, or board of directors.

Section 122 (2) of Jamaica’s supreme law, the Constitution, directs that reports of the auditor general are to be sent to the Speaker, “who shall cause them to be laid before the House of Representatives”. The Financial Administration and Audit Act places a similar obligation on the Speaker. Further, Standing Order 69 of the rules governing the House lists among the duties of the PAC, the examination of the accounts of monies appropriated by Parliament and “the report of the auditor general on any such accounts”.

VOTE OF THE HOUSE

Last week, when Speaker Charles relented and allowed the tabling of the auditor general’s report on the CMU, he declined to forward it to the PAC, ostensibly because the committee’s public discussion of the document would prejudice the court cases against Messrs Reid, Pinnock and the others. However, there must be questions as to whether this power resides in the Speaker in his own right.

Standing Order 77 (7) confines deliberations of select committees, such as the PAC, to matters referred to them “by the House”, but also allows for the “extension or limitation thereof by the House”. This language suggests that the limitation imposed by Mr Charles on the PAC’s review of the auditor general’s report wasn’t his prerogative, but properly that of the House, as a whole, whose members, in the circumstance, ought to have been asked to vote on the matter.

In any event, the Parliament, as a separate arm of Government, must be able to conduct its business in the interest of the people, confident that the courts, similarly, can do their own, appropriately insulated from overreach by, or spillover from, the legislature.

Indeed, lawyers and judges know how to select, and instruct, juries and to conduct cases to avoid the judicial process being contaminated by prejudiced witnesses, or prejudicial evidence. If not, our systems are not as strong as we give them credit for.