Editorial | DPP overstepped on Integrity Commission issue

Even if it were with the best of intentions, it is unfortunate that Paula Llewellyn inserted herself into the scrap between the Integrity Commission (IC) and members of the Holness administration, and appears to have taken sides.

Ms Llewellyn, the director of public prosecutions (DPP), left little doubt that she disapproves of the conduct of the IC, aspects of whose internal decision-making on matters of law she can be asked to advise on. So, with her public chiding of the commission, a largely coequal agency, the DPP will likely raise questions in several quarters about her judgement, and probably her impartiality and intention.

The Integrity Commission is an independent anti-corruption body that is accountable to Parliament. It annually receives and reviews income, assets and liabilities statements of legislators and some public-sector employees. It also polices the award and execution of government contracts.

Since its launch in 2018 – taking over the responsibilities of three previous bodies – the commission has had an uneasy relationship with the administration of Prime Minister Andrew Holness. But lingering resentments against the IC turned openly toxic in recent months in the wake of complaints by government politicians of its handling of investigations of members of the administration. There are now proposals that would effectively neuter the commission.

UNDERLYING ISSUE

Among the underlying issues is the commission’s continuing failure to certify Mr Holness’ integrity filings for 2021 and a political bust-up in February over its handling of a report of its investigation of whether the PM influenced the award of contracts to a friend and colleague a dozen years earlier, while he was the education minister. The commission tabled the report by its director of investigations recommending that the IC’s independent director of corruption prosecution consider bringing charges against Mr Holness for breaching the government’s procurement rules. The next day, however, a report by its corruption prosecutor was sent to Parliament saying that the recommended charges could not be sustained against Mr Holness. But by then, there had already been widescale political and other commentary based on the original document.

More recently, the commission fell under more government assault for issuing an addendum to a year-old report to withdraw adverse comments against a former national security minister, Peter Bunting, for approving gun licences to two people against whom intelligence agencies had raised concerns, while maintaining its admonition of Mr Bunting’s successor, Robert Montague, who is a member of the governing Jamaica Labour Party. The difference between the two cases is that Mr Bunting, as the IC conceded its revision, acted on the recommendation of an appeals panel, while Montague, acting on discretion allowed by the law, decided contrary to the recommendation of the appeal board.

Government members have also been peeved that the IC publicly disclosed that neither Prime Minister Holness nor members of his Cabinet signed its code of conduct on public integrity. The commission’s action was characterised by the legal affairs and constitutional reform minister, Marlene Malahoo Forte, as an attempt at public shaming. Meanwhile, the justice minister, Delroy Chuck, accused the agency of being without integrity and said its reports carried no weight on the government members of parliament.

CAULDRON

It is into this cauldron that Ms Llewellyn stepped. Calling the Integrity Commission by name, she implied that it failed to operate with appropriate circumspection and calm.

Law-enforcement agencies, she said – whether their remit, like the DPP’s, was via the Constitution, or as commissions of Parliament – enjoyed great power, which they have to exercise responsibly and with transparency. They ought not to leave the perception of “unconscious bias”.

Ms Llewellyn added, “You cannot indict somebody on the basis of perception or suspicion … There must be an evidential basis to make an adverse decision, whether at the administrative level or at the criminal level … .

“I do not come out in the public domain and mischaracterise anybody because, irrespective of the antecedent of that person, unless they have been convicted previously of a crime, everybody is entitled to their good name.”

One reading is that others, presumably the IC, did not operate with the restraint of the Office of the DPP. But that is not, appropriately, a judgement for the DPP. Especially one so publicly delivered.

Ms Llewellyn ought not be surprised if many Jamaicans perceive her, perhaps unwittingly, of having entered the fray as a partisan.

There are other reasons why Ms Llewellyn should be mindful of this. While the IC’s director of corruption prosecution operates independently, the holder of that office can, on her own volition or at the direction of the commission, request an opinion from the DPP whether to initiate criminal proceedings “under this act or any other enactment, or on a point of law”.

Significantly, if there is a difference of opinion between the two, the DPP’s opinion “shall prevail and be binding”.

In the circumstance, the DPP should not want a premature colouring of any discourse, given that former heads of at least one of the agencies that were folded into the IC often complained that the Office of the DPP was not sufficiently aggressive in prosecuting corruption.