Education ministry, NWA and SDC cleared
Jamaica
The Ministry of Education and two state agencies named in the Integrity Commission’s report on the circumstances surrounding the award of Government contracts to Westcon Construction over several years, were absolved of having to answer to allegations of breaches of the Contractor General Act, by failing to report over 20 contracts among them to the Contractor General.
In a letter to the speaker of the House of representatives and the president of the senate dated January 12 — a month prior to the tabling of the report in the House of Representatives this Tuesday — the commission’s director of corruption prosecution Keisha Prince-Kameka said although there is no limitation period for the prosecution of offences under the Act, “a likely challenge to these proceedings is one of a lack of fairness to the accused, on the basis of the constitutional right to a fair trial within a reasonable time, in accordance with the Constitution of Jamaica”, in reference to the National Works Agency (NWA) and the Ministry of Education, which the commission in its report said had failed to report 25 multimillion-dollar contracts between them, in their quarterly contract awards (QCAs).
Prince-Kameka said there was not enough evidence to mount charges against the NWA and the education ministry for breaches, for failing to report the award of multiple contracts to the contractor general in their QCA reports as “the prosecution would be hard pressed to resist an abuse of process application with regard to undue delay”.
She said the offence of disobeying a lawful request from the contractor general in regard to the QCAs, and a lack of lawful justification for failing to comply, had not been sufficiently proven.
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