Enemy of the good
What a difference a day makes!
One day Siparia MP Kamla Persad-Bissessar is threatening President Max Richards with court action: literally, the next she finds herself dragged before Parliament’s Privileges Committee to answer misbehaviour charges.
While Attorney General Brigid Annisette-George was in the middle of her contribution, in the House of Representatives, on the Integrity in Public Life Bill, on Friday afternoon, up popped young eager beaver Information Minister Neil Parsanlal, sporting a youth man clean-shaven hairstyle, to present a motion seeking to have Kamla, a former Attorney General, dragged before the dreaded Privileges Committee.
Parsanlal in his strident tones, amidst some heckling by Opposition members, accused her of tarnishing the office of the President the last time she was in Parliament because of her criticisms of Professor Richards.
She had accused the President of delaying the appointment of the Integrity Commission but, according to Parsanlal, who gave a chronology of events, the facts showed that she was clearly misleading the Parliament.
He charged that she had “willfully and deliberately” brought the office of the President into “odium, ridicule and public distrust”.
Tut, tut!
Kamla looked at the young man with a nervous smile, and when he sat down, Speaker Barendra Sinanan startled the Opposition by announcing that he was suspending the sitting until 5p.m. to consider the motion. They didn’t like it one bit but he told them that parliamentary procedure allowed him to so do.
That was around 3:20 p.m. The tea break is usually around 4:30p.m. so there was more time to have a late lunch and an extra cup of coffee which is necessary to stay awake during long, boring speeches in that august chamber.
When the sitting resumed, promptly at 5 o’clock, the Speaker simply stated that there was a prima facie case, made out by young Parsanlal and the matter would be sent to the Privileges Committee to add to the one or two other misdemeanours the said Committee is dealing with. That is, whenever it can raise a quorum.
These things do drag on but the point is that this was a sorry affair in that the President had written the Oppositon to have its views about the proposed appointees.
The Opposition turns around and charges poor Dr Richards with delaying the appointment and preventing the public from having a Commission to complain about corruption etc. and on top of that threatens the President with court action, giving him a 21-day deadline to appoint a new Commission or else!
In the meantime, Opposition Leader Basdeo Panday makes the ridiculous claim that he had misplaced the President’s letter; some new staff member had received it and nobody could find it etc. etc.
What high comedy!
Anyway, the President had got the point: he fired back at the Opposition accusing them of misrepresenting the issue to the media and announced that he was appointing a Commission before the week was out.
This he did some four hours before Parliament met; the new chairman being a Roman Catholic priest Father Henry Charles, a man who spent a good part of his life studying in several universities all over the world, accumulating degrees in ethics, law and in how to be a good priest, among other things.
The other members include veteran lawyer Gladys Gafoor, former vice-president of the Industrial Court who chaired commissions of enquiry into banking and the health sector; former High Court Judge Zainool Hosein; National Insurance Board (NIB) CEO Jeffrey McFarlane and accountant Laila Rose Badal.
During the debate, Transport Minister Colm Imbert felt that changes to the legislation were necessary, relating about the occasion malicious charges against him were brought to the Commission.
The new legislation now makes it incumbent on persons making complaints against officials covered in the Act to swear to an affidavit and also to give details of the complaint.
Opposition MP Subhas Panday felt that the new legislation would have the effect of making the Commission a “paper bulldog” and would allow the Government to go on a rampage.
The Princes Town MP further argued that people with information about corrupt public officials would be intimidated by the new rules and would not want to come forward.
AG Annissette insisted that in its current form the Commission was an “enemy of the good”, arguing that honest and capable persons were shying away from public service.