NATIONAL Security Minister Dr Horace Chang yesterday defended the viability of the bulletproof/ballistic vests worn by members of the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF).

Dr Chang, who was responding to suggestions that a police officer, wearing a bulletproof vest, was shot and wounded while flushing out criminals in St Catherine last Friday, assured the House of Representatives’ Standing Finance Committee (SFC) reviewing the 2022/23 Estimates of Expenditure (budget) at Gordon House that only the best quality vests were acquired by the JCF.

He told fellow MPs who make up the SFC that the local police had access to the “best quality” protective gear, which are acquired and tested by the force.

“There is a small gap in the supply of the vests, but what we buy are the best quality vests,” the minister insisted, after Opposition MP Angela Brown Burke questioned whether there was going to be proper investigation into the matter.

He was also questioned by Opposition MP Fitz Jackson as to whether the allocation made to the JCF in the 2022/23 expenditure was enough to help transform the situation and reduce the nightmarish fear in the society of gangsters locked up in jail being able to continue sending out directives from behind prison bars.

Turning to the police used-car saga, which broke in 2017 after it was discovered that the ministry had paid nearly $427 million to procure and deliver 200 pre-owned vehicles to the JCF, which the dealer failed to deliver, leading to a persistent lack of transportation for the cops and an outstanding debt owed to the dealer.

Dr Chang explained that the JCF is in possession of depleted fleet of vehicles, including 1,530 fleet vehicles, which had been acquired in recent times and which has been under a fleet management system, which has been installed, including all vehicles acquired recently.

“That means that we maintain a real-time location on them. We can tell you where they are and what they are doing and we can just manage that,” Dr Chang noted.

He said that the other 700 was a “plethora” of old vehicles that had, at the time, some 16 brands of vehicles of varying quality and standards and in various state, because getting parts and keeping them intact has been challenging.

“From time to time, special efforts are made to bring them on stream and that is where we have a challenge, as one or two garages work on them outside the fleet,” he noted..

The police used-car saga broke after it was discovered that the ministry had paid nearly $427 million to procure and deliver 200 pre-owned vehicles to the JCF. The company failed to deliver all the long-running police used-car leading to a persistent howl for repayment of the funds.

Some $15 billion has been included in the 2023/24 budget for the police force.