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Integrity Commission underscores need for more manpower

Jan 16, 2019 News

Chairman of the Integrity Commission, Kumar Doraisami, has underscored the need for additional manpower to assist the Commission in the performance of its duties.
The Integrity Commission was established under the laws, which provide for every person who is a person in public life to make disclosures of their assets.
However, the Commission is made of essentially Doraisami and his two supporting Commissioners, Rosemary Benjamin-Noble and Rabindranauth Persaud. They are assisted by the Secretary Amanda Jaisingh.
The Chairman noted that the commissioners are not full-time employees and there is need for more staff.
“We are all employed elsewhere and we try to meet as often as we can. Sometimes, when someone is sick, we have to wait until that person recovers. We need staff but we can’t hire people without money,” he said.
While the Chairman noted that the declarations were coming in slowly, he stressed that the manpower is needed at the level of the Commission to ensure the forms submitted are authentic.
Additionally, with hundreds of public officers still to declare their assets to the Integrity Commission, there is the view that the penalties need to be strengthened.
Doraisami, had previously told Kaieteur News that the newly installed members are examining the offences section of the current legislation and will make their recommendations to Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo.
“The Act came into force in 1997 and we are looking at the entire legislation to determine where we can strengthen. One of the areas is the penalties. We need to revisit those and toughen them where necessary,” Doraisami stated.
The Commission disclosed last week that it had written to public officers, including Members of Parliament (MPs) to have them declare their assets.
A total of 1,296 letters were dispatched to those who are mandated to file their declarations with the Commission on or before June 30, each year.
To date, the Commission has received some 400 responses and according to Doraisami only some MPs have responded.
According to the legislation, “If a public officer fails, without reasonable cause, to file a declaration with the Commission within the specified time or files an incomplete or false declaration shall be liable, on summary conviction, to a fine of $20,000 and to imprisonment for a term of not less than six months nor more than one year.”
Similar penalties apply to public officers who fail to comply with a request made by the Commission, or a tribunal. Where the offence involves the non-disclosure, by the public officer of property, which should have been disclosed in the declaration, a Magistrate convicting the person shall order the public officer to make full disclosure of the property within a given time.
Failure to comply with the order of the Magistrate within a given time, the offence shall be deemed to be a continuing offence and the person shall be liable to a further fine of $10,000 for each day on which the offence continues.
As it relates to unaccounted wealth, the court will impose a fine equivalent to one and one half times the value of the property or pecuniary resource found to be in the possession of the public officer.
Every person in public life who receives a gift worth more than $10,000 must declare it to the Commission stating the name and address of the donor, the description and approximate value of such gift and whether, in the opinion of the done, the gift is a personal gift or a State gift.

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