Catch me if you can
By Clarence Rambharat
Welcome to the land of sun, sea and no consequences. As we move to acquire more prison space, not one politician or high-profile crook occupies existing jailhouse real estate. Crafty lawyers and their crooked clients have combined to permanently engage the pause button. Justice delayed is punishment denied; a fiat to the well-positioned to thief even more.
There is no shortage of evidence of how the rot set in and stayed in. It’s the same coming out of the commissions, media stories and revelations in Parliament and official reports like the latest from the Auditor General. There is little accountability, responsibility, responsible leadership and enforcement.
The tone for neglect is at the top. The law is porous and wherever it has bite it meanders disgracefully. The politicians are unreliable. The Prime Minister casually taps the still-investigated and disgraced ex-FIFA vice president to perform the duties of PM. Without question, His Excellency makes the appointment. Former president Arthur NR Robinson may be maligned but at least he risked controversy in the 18-18 scenario and his refusal of Panday’s nominees for the Senate.
Alongside the CL Financial and HCU stories of poor governance, directors and officers of incalculable ineptitude, downright theft, thuggery and bobol comes the latest Auditor General’s report of the persistent lack of accountability in the State, especially in relation to contracts of employment, salaries, contracts with suppliers and verification of assets and inventory.
Again the tone should be set at the top. Amongst the ministries failing to provide critical reports on a timely basis or at all, many are headed by senior People’s Partnership Ministers. It includes the Ministries of the Attorney General, Housing, Foreign Affairs, Public Utilities, Works, Local Government and the Office of the Prime Minister. Failure to provide these reports is contrary to law but who cares.
The Auditor General reports that in breach of the law accounts were received several months late from 15 accounting officers. The public servants overseeing State finances are qualified and experienced professionals, but in many instances there was non-compliance with financial instructions, financial regulations and other financial directives. And by the end of March 2012, there were no reports from 13 receivers of revenue and 15 administering officers were either late or failed to submit financial statements.
The impact on the reliability of the audit is significant. Non-receipt of certified financial statements from six administering officers related to withdrawals of nearly $700 million. And these failures were from the ministries of Labour, Public Utilities, Local Government, Sport and the Office of the PM.
Each year the Auditor General moves to a new report with the same type of complaints but without updates on the consequences. Public servants holding accounting job titles clearly have no regard for accountability. All of these deviant public servants will enjoy the automatic pay increases and all will be pushed further up the public service totem pole, without consequence.
In every part of the State the Auditor General highlights the lack of employment contracts, uncertainty over salaries, terms and conditions and the absence of documents in support of payments. For nearly $100 million in rent payments a year, there are no formal contracts. In 2009 the Ministry of Local Government entered into an agreement for the lease of office and car park space and security services for a particular location. Since then over $18 million has been paid out but the space remains unoccupied.
In places like the judiciary new computers purchased for $300,000 were not seen and minor equipment purchases of about half a million dollars could not be verified. In the period 2005 to 2011 overpayments by the Ministry of Education (MoE) was about $41 million, with no mention of how much of that has been recovered from 2005-2010.
Deficiencies were found at various constituency offices (20 out of 41 were reviewed) and even at the Office of the Prime Minister, half of the sample produced no signed contracts of employment. Contract employment cost the State $443 million in the 2011 financial year based on responses from 25 (out of 46) permanent secretaries/heads of department. The true figure could be close to a billion dollars. Still the lack of contracts, evidence of approvals, details of terms and conditions and the proof of transparency must trouble the taxpayer who has to meet this enormous expenditure year after year.
With the impending State-sponsored celebrations of good government, our permanent celebration of oneness and uniqueness is delusional. Our façade of pan, chutney and kaiso barely hide the bobol which defines us. Spineless and toothless, too many of us have endorsed the selfish pursuit of easy money and too many of us stand for nothing.
Racketeering should be in our watchwords, discipline and production long gone.
This is not a country of just corrupt politicians but a country of people who elect them when we ought to know better. Ailing with “who we go put” watch who we put and watch what happens next, every time. There is no easy solution but a retreat from our senses as we substitute our own understanding of right, wrong, fairness and consequence.
Peter used to pay for Paul and Paul used to pay for everybody. Now in Carnival and callaloo country nobody pays the price and nobody stands the consequences. The current regime is busy uncovering the crimes of the past while creating new ones. The next one to follow will repeat the formula, political brigands playing catch me if you can. The stench is enormous but still indistinct in a country where rot and roti share space without quarrel. This is the land of the alleged.
• Clarence Rambharat is an
attorney and university lecturer
Replies
There is no ideological difference between the political parties in Trinidad, so its all about patronage.
In other words, its about who gets the grease when which party is in power.
In the meantime, the poor and working class gets crapped on.
Glenroy, it appears that you are taking a defeatish attitude. However, this attitude towards the public purse has gone on so long that people accepts it as part of life, and that is the problem. Is the problem caused by lazy public servants. Not according to the author, because he claims that many are qualified people. Then perhaps it is in the interest of the politicians, if not the civil servants to continue doing business this way. Nevertheless we cannot simply throw our hands up in the year and give up. It will take some time to get the message to the politicians, but eventually they will take the broomstick out of their ears and hear the people.
Robert you are right about that defeatist attitude, the peoples only hope is that the present batch of politicians are not as bad as their predecessors.
Too many times large sums of money came up missing and the people who were responsible for it cannot give an account, no one in T&T has ever been jailed for misuse of the government funds. If dey make bob-ball ah sport in the olympics dey cyah beat we atall. We national sport is bob-ball.
Government come Government go same thing, they fill their pockets and ride off into the sunset, in the mean time the gap between the Haves and the have-not gets wider and no one gives a sh.t.
Corruption is a way of life in T&T, when people should be looking at what's happening around them band launching starts and the cycle begin all over again.
Carnival and callaloo is a mentality, Trini people have to wake-up and smell the coffee.
Cecil are you saying that it cannot be changed? We got to keep removing the parties when they fail to keep their promises, and eventually they will clean up their act. It will take some time, but we got to keep on pointing out the ills in the society like the author of this piece did, because we do not really like it so.
Robert doh slap meh for what ah goin to say but Trinidad need to rest carnival for about two years to slow down the country, let people see what is happening around them. D Carnival and callaloo mentality is ah distraction.