The island’s other major political party, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) has sent out a clear message to Prime Minister Dr. Keith Mitchell and his ruling New National Party ( NNP) that the perceived “level of corruption” taking place in the country will not be tolerated.
Although few in numbers, members of the NDC and their supporters, armed with placards, staged an-hour-and-a-half long demonstration in front of the Ministry of Finance last week Thursday against the alleged corrupt activities by certain political operatives of the ruling party.
Congress officials have said that they want to send a strong message to the Mitchell-led government that it has to act against corruption to “ensure that we get good governance in our country.”
Former government Senator and host of the NNP-run “Hard Talk” radio and internet programme, Sheldon Scott, is the central figure in the recently leaked ‘cellphonegate’ scandal with Digicel in which a number of persons were found to be illegally using government-paid-for mobile phones.
After labeling the development as “fake news”, Scott has finally admitted to the wrongdoing and publicly stated that he is prepared to work out a repayment schedule with government.
The Digicel cellphone bill for Scott was approximately EC$70, 000.00 for the months of April, May and June 2019.
At an estimated $23, 000.00 a month, Scott’s bill is believed to be around $828, 000.00 for the last three years since he lost his government position as a member of the Upper House.
An irate Randall Robinson, the former NDC Public Relations Officer (PRO) told THE NEW TODAY on the site of the protest action that he is not satisfied that “there was no police involvement (even though) Scott in particular has publicly admitted to committing a crime but is still on a radio touting an NNP line, despite the fact that we (NDC) have written to the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) and the Commissioner of Police (CoP)” on the issue.
Robinson argued that while “the fiscal space does not allow for ordinary people to get the resources that they need to survive, one man’s telephone bill is in excess of $20, 000.00 a month and government seems to have the fiscal space because the government has been paying the bills.”
Teachers and Public officers are currently at loggerheads with the Mitchell-led administration on its unwillingness to pay them the 25% gratuity and pension payments they are arguing are provided for them in the Grenada Constitution.
The NDC Interim Political leader, Joseph Andall who was also on the protest line, charged that “poor governance is costly,” as he pointed to the estimated “$800, 000.00 that the abuse of Sheldon Scott and the NNP has cost the taxpayers of this country.”
However, Andall who previously called on Governor General Dame Cecile La Grenade to use her powers to start a Commission of inquiry into the “Cellphonegate” scandal said, “it is not simply a question of a Commission of Inquiry into that one particular event,” but into the entire management style of the Mitchell-led administration.
He accused the current government of “running the country into the ground” and doing so “on the backs of the Grenadian people, destroying all of the institutions of our country and those that they have not destroyed, have been heavily compromised.”
He also acknowledged that while the NDC has the option of making an official complaint to the Integrity Commission, which is the body mandated by the Integrity in Public Life Act to investigate complaints made against any public servant, the NDC would not use that medium.
Andall specifically took issue with the persons who are appointed to serve on the Commission which will be responsible for investigating the complaint as most of them are deemed to be “operatives of the New National Party (and) are heavily intertwined along with their spouses and family members in the apparatus of the NNP.”
“We know that the NNP as a political party has usurped the powers of the state, therefore we have absolutely no confidence in any so-called investigation carried out by this so-called Integrity Commission,” he said.
The Integrity body is headed by female Attorney-at-law, Guyana-born Anande Trotman-Joseph, who is the wife of former Attorney General Dr. Lawrence Joseph, considered a close political confidante of PM Mitchell.
The NDC Interim Leader said: “We have a situation where it’s basically a few families controlling all of the institutions of a country and we have to draw attention to that and call on citizens to rally against that level of corruption”.
Last week’s picketing activity was also supported by former NNP Public Relations Officer, Terrence Forrester, who after parting ways with the party approximately two (2) years ago, started his own political organisation, the Grenada Progressive Movement (GPM).
According to Forrester, the “entire nation has become so numb on the elevation of corruption that continues in this country.
“I think it is troubling for our country. It damages the fabric of our society (and) the development of our youth because the examples they are seeing from the top is precisely what they would perpetuate in their lifetime and we must call on our government to cease the process of what appears to be the policy of corrupt activities within this administration,” he said.
Stating that corruption has been going on for decades, Forrester said that “corruption is no longer acceptable in the governance of our country.”
In his political involvement in the country for 47 years, Dr. Mitchell has been the target of two previous commission of inquiries – the first was the Lindsay Worrell Commission in March 1991, which looked into the management of several public utilities under his watch including Gravel Concrete and Emulsion Production Corporation, GRENLEC, Central Garage and the Roads Division of the Ministry of Works.
The second Commission of Inquiry was conducted by Barbadian jurist Sir. Richard Cheltenham and surrounded an alleged bribe of US$500, 000.00 to PM Mitchell from convicted fraudster Eric Resteiner in St. Moritz, Switzerland in the year 2000 in exchange for a diplomatic posting and diplomatic passport.
According to the NDC interim leader, the investigation that the NDC is calling for now “is one made up of genuinely independent people without any commitment to political parties, particularly the ruling party.
“We want them to have the same powers that regular investigators and prosecutors have and we are also asking that should any evidence of criminal conduct be uncovered that it be vigorously prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” Andall said.
“We cannot have a situation where ordinary poor people end up at the Richmond Hill Prison for stealing 2 coconuts and a packet of Crix and then members of the ruling party, blatantly, brazenly and constantly steal from the coffers of the state, which is in effect stealing from the pockets of the poor and a man (Scott) just say okay, ah go (I will) pay back the money and that just done. No, the law must be allowed to take its course,” he added.