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Let’s Start Here Prime Minister Holness !

Contrac­tor General Greg Christie recent­ly lament­ed the lack of will on the part of Jamaican Authorities to once and for all effec­tive­ly clean up the mess of the award­ing of pub­lic contracts.

In deliv­er­ing the Seventh Annual Lecture in the Caribbean International Network (CIN) Lecture Series in New York last night, Christie chron­i­cled sev­er­al rea­sons which sub­stan­ti­ate his view that there is a lack of polit­i­cal will to seri­ous­ly fight cor­rup­tion in pub­lic con­tract­ing in JamaicaRead more: http://​www​.jamaicaob​serv​er​.com/​l​a​t​e​s​t​n​e​w​s​/​C​h​r​i​s​tie – No-political-will-to-fight-corruption-in-Jamaica#ixzz1c8Jmhp7r
Greg Christie has been in my mind a tire­less fight­er for fideli­ty , trans­paren­cy and cred­i­bil­i­ty for the Jamaican peo­ple through the office he holds. What makes Christie cred­i­ble in my eyes is the fact that he has vowed to demitt office in November of next year. Cristie lament­ed the lack of action on the part of Government to enact a raft of sug­ges­tions he has fur­nished them,that would have giv­en teeth to the Office of Contractor General.
Christie went on :

“Make no mis­take about it. The prob­lems and the chal­lenges that I have sought to overview with you… which have con­front­ed the OCG and me, will per­sist as long as the OCG’s many reme­di­al rec­om­men­da­tions con­tin­ue to be ignored,” he said.“They will remain with us until and unless the OCG is grant­ed inde­pen­dent crim­i­nal inves­ti­ga­to­ry pow­ers, inde­pen­dent pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al pow­ers, police pow­ers of arrest, and the pow­er to halt or to reg­u­larise a gov­ern­ment con­tract­ing process that is exhibit­ing the signs of cor­rup­tion, impro­pri­ety or irregularity.”

Andrew Holness

Greg Christie
Greg Christie

Andrew Holness Jamaica’s young Prime Minister has a momen­tous but not insur­mount­able task ahead of him, he could start by look­ing at the sug­ges­tions of Contractor General Greg Christie, and imme­di­ate­ly move to enact these sug­ges­tions where prac­ti­ca­ble into law, I mean whats the prob­lem with hon­esty and integri­ty? Holness has begun by ask­ing the leader of the oppo­si­tion to walk with him through gar­ri­son com­mu­ni­ties ‚a sym­bol­ic move Holness feels will go a long way in begin­ning the dis­man­tling of zones of polit­i­cal exclu­sions. As noble as that call is I would pre­fer to see sub­stan­tive actions enact­ed into law that will strength­en the hand of this and future Contractors General in going after entrenched cor­rup­tion in the han­dling of pub­lic funds. This move will not be easy,there are many peo­ple in high places in Jamaica who ben­e­fits from tax­pay­ers funds through the award­ing of contracts,many are high-pro­file donors to both polit­i­cal par­ties, but many more are crim­i­nals that sup­port the par­ties. Contractor General Christie and his staff has received numer­ous death threats for dar­ing to stand up and fight for our country.
Greg Christie does not ask for pow­ers to stoke his ego,as some in some new Agencies seem to think their posi­tion was cre­at­ed for,this Jamaican has demon­strat­ed the will­ing­ness and char­ac­ter nec­es­sary to turn around the endem­ic cul­ture of graft , nepo­tism and cor­rup­tion that obtains in the country.

Andrew Holness begins serv­ing as Prime Minister, with a year left before Parliamentary Elections are con­sti­tu­tion­al­ly due. He can make big bold steps , or try to fool the crowd with cheap pos­tur­ing while main­tain­ing the sta­tus quo, in which case he would be fol­low­ing his men­tor Bruce Golding out the door. There is noth­ing hard in push­ing leg­is­la­tion that pro­tects the Jamaican peo­ple, whats hard is my inabil­i­ty to under­stand why this has not been done.