Jamaica watchers would be well aware that Prime Minister Golding and his government face collapse over the ongoing scandal surrounding the US lobbying firm Manatt, Phelps & Phillips (MPP), in particular, the questions of who hired it and what exactly for.
Stripped to the bare essentials, the complaint against Mr Golding’s government is that MPP was hired by Kingston to lobby Washington to back track on its extradition request for alleged drug kingpin Christopher `Dudus’ Coke. Mr Coke’s former fiefdom is a traditional stronghold of the ruling party and there are well-established ties between him and many party and government functionaries, notwithstanding the subsequent bloody campaign to capture him when the government was forced into action by the embarrassing revelations. If the lobbying mission is determined to be as charged, the sordidness of this transaction would effectively banish Mr Golding back to the wilderness together with several of his senior government officials and leaving incalculable damage to the Jamaica Labour Party. The dangerous dance of Jamaica’s don politics aside and its influence on all sides of the divide, what is striking about the present situation is the desperate battle by Mr Golding and his party to survive at all cost even though it must be evident that credibility is damaged beyond repair. That unwillingness to apprehend the reality will do untold damage to the Jamaican people’s view of their government and institutions.
The news is not all bad as Jamaicans were able to see the robust and unhindered functioning of the island-nation’s Access to Information (ATI) legislation which had been piloted in 2002. It was a shrewd request by the Jamaica Gleaner newspaper to the relevant public authority which released email correspondence between MPP and Jamaican Solicitor General Mr Douglas Leys and attorney Mr Harold Brady.
It is this sequence of electronic correspondence published by the Gleaner that draws the Jamaican government even closer to the work of MPP as it appeared to show the solicitor general, Mr Leys not only giving instructions to the law firm but also acting on instructions from its officials. Further, the emails indicated that the Prime Minister and his Attorney General Ms Dorothy Lightbourne were kept abreast of developments and involved in decision-making
In one sliver, Mr Brady says to MPP in a mail that was copied to Mr Leys “We have to talk on Monday after we have had a chance to brief the PM and the AG (Lightbourne)“.
Whether or not the release of these emails will lead to the tipping point two things are clear: the Jamaican media is playing its role in exposing the seamier side of government business in Kingston and that irrespective of the government, those public servants entrusted with responding to queries for the release of public documents, as catered for under the Access to Information Act, discharged their obligations professionally and fearlessly.
That such sensitive electronic correspondence could be released makes a compelling case for legislation of this type and its potential to shine a light in crevices which the government of the day would be energetically disinclined to permit. It also restores some faith in that hallowed but uneasy line delineating the function of the public servant from those of the political directorate in the minister’s office.
If similar legislation existed here, would it have been possible for a public servant to be able to release to a newspaper, information detrimental to the government? We think not. This government is into the control business and is obsessively paranoid about the release of information of the type that was provided in Jamaica precisely because of the risk to its image and the prospect of the exposing of wrong-doing and corruption.
Think of what might have been released on Synergy’s capability in relation to the Amaila Falls road, the cash bailout of the Buddy’s Hotel, the scale of the budget for the cricket stadium and the hosting of the world cup and the expenses connected to President Jagdeo’s frenetic travel schedule.
Yet, history will judge this government very harshly on access to information legislation. For all its bluster and bravado it is clear that the PPP/C in its 18 years in government – 11 of those under President Jagdeo – has a dire phobia and fear about access to information. It has hemmed and hawed in the wake of an urgent need for the law considering the billions and billions of taxpayer and donor-funded dollars that have been sunk in some questionable projects and the likelihood that many of those benefiting from procurement were either not qualified or produced substandard work. ATI legislation would have provided a useful tool both for the government to subject itself to scrutiny and for members of the public to satisfy themselves of the probity or lack thereof of their elected government.
It is now very late in the day and President Jagdeo’s own standing has been marked down as he gave his word in Trinidad in April 2009 that his government would shortly present ATI legislation along with a broadcast authority bill. More than 16 months after this solemn commitment President Jagdeo has failed to live up to his promise despite the fact that ATI legislation had already been introduced in the House by the Alliance For Change.
There have been many appeals and exhortations for the government to proceed in this direction. A November 26, 2001 editorial in this newspaper headed `Time ripe for a Freedom of Information Act’ urged that “The Jagdeo administration should test these waters. It speaks frequently about open and transparent government. It therefore should have nothing to fear from providing its citizens with a potent tool for full disclosure. The culture of secrecy and information control is alive and well here in the form of the Public Corporations Act, the public service rules and the general disdain for the public right to know. It is time that this begins to change.” Time does fly and things remain the same.
More recently, in May, 2008 Mr Toby Mendel of the Article 19 group told Members of Parliament at a seminar on the East Coast that it was an embarrassment that a country that held itself out as a democracy did not have an ATI law. He aptly described it as the “Oxygen of democracy”.
How will the PPP defend this aberration now and in the future?
Jamaica and Trinidad have led the Caribbean on the path to openness and transparency compliments of ATI and it is disgraceful that the PPP/C has consigned Guyana to backwards governance by neglecting this law.
