CORRUPTION

March 22, 2014, By KNews, Filed Under Features/Columnists, Peeping Tom, Source

It is more than a bit ironic for A Partnership for National Unity(APNU) to be suggesting that a functioning Integrity Commission is needed to address widespread corruption, namely, of course, public corruption.

For the record it was the PNCR, the main partner in APNU which had in the past consistently refused to recognize the then Chairman of the Integrity Commission, Bishop Randolph George. Hoyte refused to recognize the Bishop as the chairperson of the Commission.

After, the Bishop stepped down as Chairperson, it was discovered that a number of then opposition parliamentarians had not submitted their returns to the Integrity Commission in keeping with the laws of the country. This forced the then President Bharrat Jagdeo to remind the opposition that notwithstanding the appointment of a Chairman of the Commission, the law is the law and should be complied with.

It would be most interesting to know just how many of the parliamentarians of today have submitted their statutory declarations to the Integrity Commission as required by law and how many are in dereliction of this duty.

The opposition, of course had long held that the new appointees to the Integrity Commission were arbitrary and unconstitutional. If memory serves me correct, an action was even filed in the Courts challenging the constitutionality of the appointment to the Commission.

The Integrity Commission has been in place since 1992. The laws were revamped by the PPPC administration in 1997 but there always remained differences between the government and the opposition. These differences went back to the appointment of Bishop Randolph George who Hoyte adamantly refused to recognize.

Now we have had the suggestion that there is a need for a functioning Integrity Commission to help stem widespread corruption in the public sector. But is the Integrity Commission, the answer?

There are Integrity Commissions in other jurisdictions in the Caribbean and their functioning has been the subject of all kinds of controversies, including suggestions that they are not politically neutral. These Integrity Commissions have failed also to make a huge dent into the public’s perception of official corruption.

These commissions are a part of a raft of institutions which were adopted by newly independent states in the hope of mimicking institutions in the developed world. But as argued before, these institutions such as the Office of the Ombudsman, Service Commissions, Integrity Commissions etc have not been as effective in newly independent countries as they have been in western countries.

One of the problems is not so much the functioning of these institutions but rather the functioning of the system of government. In developing countries there are numerous institutional checks and balances within the public bureaucracy. Here in the Caribbean, we have not yet developed that degree of checks and balances.

The fight against public corruption has to begin by reforming the system of checks and balances within government departments. It cannot begin by merely having institutions that exercise oversight over a highly porous bureaucracy. If for example someone is abusing state property, this is best dealt with within the institution through a system of checks and balances. Such abuse may never be identified and no one will want to risk their career to take such a matter up to the Integrity Commission. As such a great deal of corruption falls through the cracks.

Secondly, there is an internal culture of accountability and independence within western governmental bureaucracies. But here in the Caribbean, we have serious problems with both accountability and independence of the public service.

The system of accounting in the civil service is based on two main variables, revenues and expenditure. If you ask any government ministry to indicate the total value of the assets under their control, they would be unable to tell you. But if you ask them to state how much monies they spent each year, you will obtain a precise answer. Yet for all we know, ministries may be in a state of de-capitalization even though their voted provisions may be increasing each fiscal year. The system of accounting in government therefore needs to be revamped to improve and widen financial and managerial accountability.

There is equally the problem of a lack of political independence of our institutions. We like to delude ourselves into believing that once certain service commissions are in place that our public institutions will be politically neutral. This is however far from so.

As one Caribbean Prime Minister reminded an audience in Guyana in 2005, there are bureaucrats who have their own ways of playing politics. In fact in many instances, they are more partisan than the political parties themselves. After close to fifty years of independence in the Caribbean, we still delude ourselves about the idea of political neutrality of the civil service.

And so the same flawed logical follows. If only certain institutions were functioning, we would be able to better address widespread public corruption.

There is much better alternative. The smaller the size of government the less will be the possibility of corruption. But do not try to sell that idea to some Caribbean politicians. The State and its institutions are a prized acquisition. The public bureaucracy is an attractive political asset which some politicians wish to have control over. Instead of reducing its size and scope, many a politician, desires to expand its range.

It is their political base, their kingdom.   And as one former Caribbean Prime Minister once indicated, this kingdom can become be transformed into a thiefdom.