By COREY CONNELLY Monday, September 7 2009

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Basdeo Panday...

Opposition Leader Basdeo Panday yesterday said Prime Minister Patrick Manning may abolish the Integrity Commission.

He was commenting on Manning’s announcement, during the People’s National Movement’s (PNMs) rally at Mayaro Recreation Ground on Saturday, that the Government was reviewing the procedures for the appointment of members to the commission.

“The Integrity Commission just is not working and the Government has to go back to the drawing board on the Integrity Commission,” Manning had told supporters.

All five members of the last Integrity Commission, including chairman Father Henry Charles, resigned in May within 11 days of being appointed. President George Maxwell Richards, who had installed the members, has publicly apologised for the collapse of the commission. Last Friday, the Opposition piloted a motion for a tribunal to be set up to have Richards removed from office because of the collapse of the commission.

Panday yesterday said the Government does not want the Integrity Commission “because they are afraid there would be too much investigation into their affairs.

“If not they would just water it down so badly or abolish it,” he added.

Tabaquite MP Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj had a different take on the issue.

He said under the draft working document on constitutional reform, the Prime Minister may very well be responsible for the appointment of members to a new Integrity Commission.

Maharaj said the draft working document showed there would be a fundamental shift in the operations of independent state institutions, such as the Judiciary, Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions and the Elections and Boundaries Commission.

Maharaj said under the existing system, the President, in his discretion, appointed members to commissions. “He is not exactly party political,” he added.

Maharaj said under the working document, it is envisaged that the Prime Minister would be the head of both the Government and State.

“Manning would be both Prime Minister and President and he virtually will choose the Chief Justice, DPP and members of commissions,” he claimed.

“He would be responsible for the hiring and firing of police officers, teachers and members of the Integrity Commission. He will be in total control of the State and the people will be surrendering all safeguards and checks and balances into one person that controls office.”

Constitutional expert Kenneth Lalla, SC, said Manning’s announcement was ambiguous.

“It is barren rather than enlightening,” he said.

Lalla, former chairman of the Police Service Commission, said the PM did not explain whether he intended to amend the law to reconstruct the commission by varying the requirements for prospective appointees. Manning also did not indicate if there was a consensus that the President has been unable to appoint members because people were generally unwilling to serve, Lalla said.

“Is it that they are not willing to be appointed by the current President having regard to the fiasco that took place?” he asked. “Or is it that they feel they will now be up for public scrutiny?”

Chairman of the TT Transparency Institute (TTTI) Victor Hart supported the Government’s decision to review the commission but felt that it must be done through widespread public consultation.

“Since 2003, we have been saying that there was need to review the operations of the Integrity Commission,” he said. “Therefore, we agree with the Prime Minister that there is need to go back to the drawing board.”

Hart said over the past three months, TTTI had been seeking funding to host a stakeholders’ conference to discuss the successes and failures of the Integrity Commission so as to come up with a blue print for the way forward.

The conference, he said, would include commission members and representatives of government and civil society organisations.

Hart said the TTTI supported the commission as an institution “because its purpose is to help in reducing corruption by persons in public life.

“And the history of corruption shows that there is a lot of corruption taking place by people in public life,” he said.

The Integrity Commission was established in 1998 under the then United National Congress administration.

The Integrity in Public Life Act 1998, which gave birth to the commission, was one of the major pieces of legislation piloted by Maharaj, when he was attorney general. The legislation was reviewed in 2000 before the UNC went into Opposition. This is the Act that is currently governing the operations of the commission. Previous chairmen of the commission included Gordon Deane and John Martin.