THE public hearings of the Financial Sector Adjustment Company (Finsac) Commission, established in 2009 to investigate the factors that led to Jamaica’s financial sector collapse in the 1990s, have been made available in a public archive.

Finance Minister Dr Nigel Clarke, following through on a promise made earlier this year, announced the launch, emphasising that his personal conviction motivated the decision to make the submissions accessible, in lieu of a final report that was never done.

“The commissioner has resigned, there’s no commission, the hearings are finished, and I certainly did not think it would be appropriate for that jump drive to end up in the waste bin or for it to end up in file 13,” said Clarke during the launch event at Jamaica Pegasus hotel in Kingston on Thursday.

The commission spanned a decade, from its establishment on January 12, 2009 to 2019 — though it was disbanded from 2012 to 2016 — and cost over $160 million. A year before it was permanently disbanded, the Cabinet had lost confidence in the commission’s ability to produce a report, despite its initial efforts. Within the archives, there are two or three chapters of an initial report. However, the Cabinet, having provided funds and additional resources over time based on promises of a report, felt that there was too much exposure in continuing to allocate resources without receiving a final report.

“The commission was plagued with problems from the very beginning. A chairman of the commission had to be replaced after being challenged in court. The commission had problems finding a place to meet; it took nine months to find a suitable venue. And even after that venue was found and the chairman was replaced, the commission had starts and stops over the period,” said Clarke.

Despite facing challenges that led to its discontinuation, the information collected was handed over to the ministry in 2019. With the information provided to the Finance Ministry, Clarke expressed a sense of responsibility, saying he believes that “everyone has a responsibility to water their own garden”, meaning that individuals must manage their responsibilities well with the information they have. Clarke explained that the decision to release this information publicly began two years ago after exploring the best way to make it accessible. The decision to make the findings accessible aims to ensure that such events are neither repeated nor forgotten. The collapse, a significant event in Jamaica’s history, cost the country 40 per cent of its gross domestic product (GDP) to deal with the debt taken on by Government, taking 30 years to be paid.

Before the collapse of the financial sector, Jamaica’s debt-to-GDP ratio was in the low 70s, which surged to over 115 per cent by 2002. With debt at that level, debt repayment and wages exceeded tax revenues, leading to more accumulation of debt.

“It is incumbent on us as a society, now that we have maintained a debt level that is lower than the pre-Finsac era, and we’re on track, by the end of this fiscal year, for a debt level in the high 60s,” he stated. “It is incumbent on us to ensure that the material gathered in the public hearings during the life of the Finsac Commission is available to the public for edification, scrutiny, academic research, and most importantly, to ensure that we do not traverse this path again.”

However, Clarke emphasised that in disclosing the material, the ministry has taken care to comply with current legislative requirements. A committee was appointed to review all of the material and redact any personal information that does not meet the standard for public disclosure, as releasing such information could set a problematic precedent. He clarified that the archive is not a collection of debtor information but rather documents containing complaints and submissions — both written and oral — made to the commission.

Clarke further announced that the ministry is taking a long-term approach with the publication of the archives, allocating $10 million to both The University of the West Indies and the University of Technology, Jamaica. This funding aims to spark a research process, inviting proposals and establishing a transparent mechanism for awarding grants. The goal is to enable qualified researchers to analyse the database, supplement it with relevant information, and produce scholarly works on the period.

“We’re seeking to catalyse scholarship and scholarly research into this period using the archives but not exclusive to the archives, and it could be information from other sources that compliments the information here so that we can have peer-reviewed scholarly output that can assist policymakers in the future,” he said.

The archives are available on the Ministry of Finance and Public Service’s website at
mof.gov.jm/finsaccommissionarchives.