“The PNP has a record of honesty in government.”

— Prime Minister P J Patterson (September 27, 1997)

Contrary to this claim made by Mr Patterson, the PNP of the 1990s has no such record of honesty.

After an Administration in the 1970s steeped in the corrupt use of power, the PNP returned to old habits when it became the Government in 1989 and, indeed, set a record as the most corrupt Government in the history of the country.

The roll-call of scandals was an extensive list: Zinc for hurricane victims; Furniture for ministers’ house; Shell waiver; foreign exchange purchases; motor vehicle importation; land distribution at Holland; sand mining; National Water Commission; Operation Pride; Net-Serv Jamaica; NSWMA; Sandals Whitehouse; Montego Bay street people; Trafigura; Cuban light bulbs.

The Zinc Scandal

The outgoing JLP Government in 1989 left behind $400 million of zinc imported for the relief of the victims of Hurricane Gilbert. This was to be distributed according to the needs of all hurricane victims prepared from impartial surveys carried out by the Jamaica Defence Force and other agencies of Government. No sooner had the PNP taken office than they ignored the official list of beneficiaries and began the corrupt distribution of the zinc to supporters and gang members on both sides to implicate both parties, while the hurricane victims remained roofless.

Political activists became dealers in zinc and drove a zinc factory (GI Industries) out of business. Zinc was used instead of money to bribe voters in the 1990 Local Government Election and even a jail sentence could not prevent a PNP activist being released from prison to sell zinc and speak on an election platform in 1990.

The smell of the zinc scandal was so high that a commission of enquiry under Ombudsman EG Green was set up to look into the scandal. It produced no concrete evidence of what had transpired; no one was made to answer to the courts, but Green turned out pages of baroque prose blaming Government for excessive importation of zinc without laying blame on the corrupt transaction.

The Furniture Scandal

In February 1991 the director of public prosecutions issued arrest warrants for Robert Hill, the inventory clerk at Parliament, and businessman Canute Sadler in respect of bills totalling $1,500,000 for furniture allegedly supplied for furnishing offices and residences used by Government ministers. This was the tip of the iceberg of the furniture scandal.

The incoming ministers in the new PNP Government in 1989 decided that they wanted to live like princes on the public purse. They ordered the most luxurious fittings and appliances for homes and office. These included chandeliers, drapes valued at $250,000, crystal, hi-fi equipment, marble bathrooms, expensive rugs, and a kitchen sink costing $80,000 for one member of parliament. When the scandal broke, all the princes professed innocence.

Some claimed they never got the goods, some said they didn’t know the price, and Ben Clare of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said he signed the invoices without looking at them. Prime Minister Michael Manley said the big spenders would be forced to pay for the superfluous goods they ordered but that was simply damage control, because nothing was heard of restitution.

The Shell Waiver Scandal

The Shell Waiver scandal came in December 1991. This caused a storm to break over the PNP Government and led to PJ Patterson’s resignation from the Cabinet, at which time he promised “I shall return.”

Because Petrojam, the Government-owned oil refinery, was the main provider of unleaded fuel, Government placed prohibitive duties on the importation of the commodity by other petroleum dealers. Much to the surprise of Petrojam’s Chairman Eli Matalon, Shell was allowed, under a waiver, to import, duty-free, huge quantities of unleaded fuel that should have attracted a duty of $29 million.

When the storm broke, the energy sector was up in arms and a Cabinet member threatened to resign if Patterson was not dismissed. But Prime Minister Manley asked all Cabinet members to resign so he could do a reshuffle.

The Foreign Exchange Scandal

The period from late 1991 to early 1992 was a time of great instability for the local currency. The Government had prematurely liberalised the economy and there were too many Jamaican dollars chasing too few US dollars. The economy was about to enter a period of 100 per cent inflation and the Government aggravated the problem by mismanaging the money supply.

The Government established the Liberalisation Unit to prevent people trading in foreign currency and this brought back memories of the dreaded Financial Intelligence Unit of the 1970s. Government was incensed when a bank bought US dollars above the official rate, but at the same time the BOJ was sending agents to the tourist areas to buy dollars above the stated rate until one day things went badly awry.

On January 3, 1993, a BOJ trader was held up at Stewart Town, St Mary, and robbed of $2.5 million. What was surprising was that it didn’t happen before, because traders were going into the BOJ garage and filling the trunks of their cars with cash to go out to do “business”.

The Motor Vehicle

There is a close connection between the Furniture Scandal and the Motor Vehicle Importation Scandal. In both cases party activists misused their positions to evade regulations and enjoy benefits to which they were not entitled.

With restrictions still in place in 1992 on the importation of motor vehicles and with heavy duties payable, PNP activists and others conspired with a highly placed person in the Trade Administrator department to import a variety of vehicles without paying duties. They defrauded the Government of $20 million in duties.

The main PNP activist in this scandal was confident that he would not face serious punishment and, in the end, paid a paltry $2-million fine. An American who was in the island to investigate Jamaican crime syndicates suggested to him that he would get off lightly because people in high places stood to be embarrassed if he told all he knew. It is significant that after the motor vehicle racket was broken up, the PNP activist (a person not known to have engineering skills) was given several lucrative road contracts.

Land Distribution

There was scandal and injustice in the distribution of land at Holland, St Elizabeth, in 1994. People who had been settled on land under the Land Lease Programme in the 1970s were dispossessed to make room for approved PNP activists, notably among them, a PNP Member of Parliament who was allotted 30 acres of land of his choice. Other well known PNP activists, a magistrate, a lawyer, and other professionals were given land while bona fide farmers who had actively cultivated the lands were denied. When this injustice was challenged, the Government spokesman defended its actions.

The Sand Mining Scandal

The PNP activist who masterminded the motor vehicle importation scandal became involved in the sand mining scandal in 1994. The activity was prohibited in the Lakes Pen area of Spanish Town where sand mining had led to the degradation of agricultural land, jeopardised dwellings, and caused the Rio Cobre to change its course. It came to public attention in April 1994 that the PNP activist was mining sand in the area on the pretext of developing fish ponds, for which purpose he had earlier secured a lease from the Rural Agricultural Development Authority.

When the breach of the law was brought to public notice, he claimed that he had applied for a mining lease but that it had not yet been approved. When Minister of Agriculture Seymour Mullings was contacted for comment he said the matter would be investigated, but the activist continued to mine sand and supply to a constant stream of trucks. Eventually, a Bill came to Parliament to increase the fine for illegal sand mining from $500 to $30,000. When the law came into effect, of course, tons of sand had already been removed from Lakes Pen, the friends of the PNP had benefited greatly, much money had been made, and the land was not restored to its former state.

The Water Commission Scandal

At a time when the National Water Commission (NWC) was $600 million in debt, at a time when it had no money to buy fittings to repair leaks or employ contractors for the purpose, at a time when it was discharging 4.5 million gallons of raw sewage per year into the Montego Bay harbour, the NWC came into further disrepute.

In June 1994, it was announced that the NWC had spent $30 million to import furniture for its offices. Apart from that, an NWC vice-president was to attend a conference in the Caribbean that would cost the organisation $300,000. It also came to light that hundreds of thousands of dollars were spent to landscape the premises at Marescaux Road.

When the news came out, JLP spokesman on public utilities Audley Shaw called on Water and Transport Minister Horace Clarke to launch an investigation, as the NWC’s priorities were clearly misplaced. Before the month of June was over, the NWC announced increases in water rates ranging between 38 per cent and 75 per cent. At the same time it announced plans to rationalise its operations.

In April 1995, the NWC was in the news again. This time the issue was the proposed importation of $4.5 million worth of new water meters that experts argued were unsuitable for local conditions, having a defect which could cause customers to be overcharged. After strong public protest the meters were sent to the Bureau of Standards to be checked. They were found to be unsuitable and the proposal to import them was dropped, but not before death threats were issued against the individuals who had opposed the use of the meters.

A Peat Marwick Mitchell audit had found the NWC to be riddled with inefficiency, mismanagement and waste. Ruddy Lawson, junior minister with responsibility for water, said his advice to the NWC had been ignored and Public Utilities Minister Bobby Pickersgill rejected several calls for his resignation.

— Edward Seaga is a former prime minister of Jamaica and currently a distinguished fellow at The University of the West Indies, and chancellor, University of Technology, Jamaica