Former NWA boss Wong fined

Friday, November 25, 2011

PATRICK Wong, the former chief executive officer of the National Works Agency (NWA), was yesterday fined $10,000 after pleading guilty to two counts of breaching the Contractor General Act.

The fine, imposed by Senior Corporate Area Resident Magistrate Judith Pusey, was immediately welcomed by the Office of the Contractor General which hailed it as an “important judicial landmark”.

“The ruling is regarded as a very important judicial landmark precedent and development as the OCG seeks to diligently discharge its mandates under the Contractor General Act to ensure that Government contracts are awarded impartially and on merit and in circumstances that do not involve impropriety or irregularity,” said an OCG statement following the sentencing.

Wong was summoned to court following a ruling by the Director of Public Prosecutions after he was accused of failing to answer a lawful request of the Contractor General. The request was in relation to the award of contracts by the NWA to contractors in St Catherine.

In court, Wong’s attorney Harold Brady argued that his client had complied with the request and that the case against him should be dismissed. But Pusey retorted that Wong had submitted the documents after the breach had already been committed.

Wong was ordered to pay $5,000 or serve 30 days on each of the two counts.

Wong resigned as head of the NWA last week following a damning report by the Auditor General into the Jamaica Development Infrastructure Programme (JDIP).

According to the report, the transport and works ministry, together with the NWA and the Road Maintenance Fund, which has the responsibility for the implementation of the JDIP, had not executed the programme in a transparent manner and cited glaring evidence of an inadequate capital project plan.