(Jamaica Gleaner) The Government has finally admitted it failed to provide the nation with clarity on the hot-button Manatt, Phelps & Phillips issue which has held centre stage since March.
The administration has also promised to answer all additional questions on the matter within the coming days.
With civil society up in arms following The Sunday Gleaner’s email exposé, Government on Tuesday said it messed up and promised to fess up.
“I read the papers yesterday (Tuesday) and I saw several different groupings, including groupings in the countryside, who still feel that there is more to the Manatt issue, and I feel it is going to be important that we separate the politics from the actual concerns and try and address it because it is a deep concern which relates to the issue of governance,” Daryl Vaz, the minister with responsibility for information, told the weekly post-Cabinet media briefing at Jamaica House.
Vaz said persons and groupings who want answers to their questions on Manatt can contact him and the Government will respond immediately.
“I think it is important that the prime minister meets with these groups over the next few weeks so that they can get their questions answered,” Vaz added.
He said that, since The Sunday Gleaner’s story on the weekend, Prime Minister Bruce Golding has already met with church leaders to answer
their questions and is now preparing a response to private sector leaders who have submitted six questions they want answered.
According to Vaz, many of these questions have already been answered but the Government is committed to providing any information requested.
“The Government, through the prime minister, has already indicated very loudly and very clearly that this matter, from the start, was a mistake for which we take full responsibility.
“Coupled with that, there was misrepresentation as it relates to the Government … which has made a bad situation worse,” Vaz added, while noting that there would be nothing criminal or illegal if the Government had engaged Manatt.
The information minister reiterated the Government’s claim that it never engaged the US law firm and declared that the position has not changed despite the emails revealed by The Sunday Gleaner.
He admitted that the Manatt muddle has hurt the Government and the country while taking focus off other positive achievements.
“This was a mistake for which we take full responsibility, and we ask well-thinking Jamaicans to work with us on the positives in all other areas,” Vaz said as he pointed to a seven per cent reduction in major crimes and many economic gains since the start of this year.
“We are not trying to sweep anything under the carpet, and I would advise persons who want more answers than we can give to utilise the avenue that was used (by The Sunday Gleaner), and that is the Access to Information Act,” he declared.
