No exceptions!

SEVERAL public officials have been referred for criminal prosecution as the Integrity Commission commences formal enforcement of its zero-tolerance policy against Jamaicans who fail to comply with the law.

The commission, in a statement yesterday, did not say how many public officials were referred for prosecution, and did not name anyone. However, it said 30-day notices had been served on several public officials who were non-compliant with the filing of statutory declarations for 2018 and 2019. At the expiration of the notice period, those officials who did not comply were referred to the commission’s director of corruption prosecution for criminal proceedings to be pursued.

At the same time, the commission has urged public officials to ensure that they file their 2020 statutory declarations no later than March 31, 2021, adding that the objective is to ensure that it secures a 100 per cent compliance filing rate by all of the country’s 37,000-plus public officials who are required to do so.

“There will be no exceptions,” said the commission’s Executive Director Greg Christie. “Laws are promulgated by the Parliament to be complied with and enforced, not to be arbitrarily ignored, disregarded or set aside.”

Chairman Justice Seymour Panton, in the commission’s 2019-2020 annual report, had warned “all public officials…to comply, as a failure to comply will result in prosecution”. The commission is now following through on that warning, read yesterday’s statement.

Section 39 (1) of the Integrity Commission Act (ICA) provides that “…every person who, on or after the appointed day, is a parliamentarian or public official shall submit to the [commission’s] director of information and complaints a statutory declaration of his assets and liabilities and his income in the form set out in the third schedule”.

“In keeping with the provisions of the law, the commission’s director of corruption prosecution has approved the offer of a discharge of liability for delinquent declarants by the payment of a lesser fine of $250,000 and the submission of the outstanding statutory declaration. Delinquent declarants who fail to pay the $250,000 fine and submit the declaration within the specified time will become liable, on summary conviction, to a fine not exceeding $500,000, or to a term of imprisonment not exceeding six months,” said the commission’s statement.