HOUSING MINISTER Dr Keith Rowley has raised questions about the businessmen who told Transparency International (TI) they paid bribes to politicians, political parties and senior public servants.
“Who are these businessmen? Who are those Ministers and public officials who are receiving more bribes this year than last year?” the Minister asked in his latest reaction to TI’s 2006 Corruption Perception Index.
Dr Rowley also asked whether TI was prepared to identify the businessmen.
The Minister issued a statement on the matter over the weekend after the Housing Development Corporation’s (HDC) East Port-of-Spain Project was identified as one of the mega-projects which might have contributed to Trinidad and Tobago’s poor showing in the Corruption Index.
He pointed out that the legislation under which the project was being executed contained provisions to satisfy the need for transparency. In addition, he said, the HDC held 17 consultations with tenants, businessmen, NGOs, private residents and religious leaders between February 5 and April 19 of this year.
“It is in these circumstances that I object to Transparency International or any entity or person misleading the population that there was any lack of transparency here. To cite the execution of this project as having any negative contribution to the Corruption Perception Index raises more questions about the TI index than it raised about the HBC and its project,” Dr Rowley said.
The Minister added, “I have no doubt that there are those who disagree with the proposed redevelopment of East Port-of-Spain but to invoke corruption in order to bolster some opposition to the project is an unsustainable position easily destroyed by truth.
“I trust that TI will agree that truth and fact are fundamental virtues and resources necessary for any platform from which to launch an attack on corruption and its precursor, lack of transparency.”
Rowley attacks Transparency Intl
The following letter was sent to,
Dr the Honourable Keith
Rowley
Minister of Housing
Ministry of Housing
#44-46 South Quay
Port-of-Spain
Dear Minister Rowley,
On behalf of the Board of Directors of the Trinidad and Tobago Transparency Institute (TTTI), the national chapter of Transparency International (TI), I am writing in response to recent reports in the media that you have taken strong objection to what you say are allegations of corruption among your public officials in the East Port-of-Spain development project made by the Institute.
We assume that your objections are prompted by what you understood us to have said in our media release issues last November 6 at the local launch of TI’s 2006 Corruption Perception Index (CPI).
It does however appear that you misunderstood, or were misinformed about, what we actually said on that occasion. At the CPI launch we reported, among other things, that, according to the CPI, there was a perception among senior business leaders in Trinidad and Tobago as well as among non-resident analysts that corruption among public officials has increased over the past year.
This was shown by the fall in our country’s score from 3.8 out of 10 in 2005 to 3.2 in 2006. And we pointed out that “Six years ago Trinidad and Tobago scored 5.3 out of 10 on the CPI. The score has fallen in every year since then.” We then asked the question, “...how could this have happened? Assuming that the five surveys used [in compiling the CIP] were done properly, so that we have a reasonably accurate idea of what the persons surveyed actually perceived, what caused them [the business leaders and analysts] to come to these conclusions?”
We suggested that one of the causes have been the apparent unwillingness of the Government “...to have serious dialogue with those who have genuine concerns about the sustainability or even feasibility of the ‘mega projects.’ The rapid rail system, the aluminium smelters and the development of East Port-of-Spain are cases in point....This lack of transparency and accountability has given rise to the suspicion that corrupt influences may be at work in the decision-making processes and practices of these huge projects, actual and planned.”
That there are such suspicions, we have no doubt. For instance, Mr Hayden Roberts, President of the East Port-of-Spain Business Association, is reported as saying that the potential for corruption will grow as the East Port-of-Spain project progresses. Whether or not the suspicions have any foundation in fact, we do not know. We do not have, and have never claimed to have, any evidence either way. It therefore would have been most irresponsible of us, possibly libellous, to say or suggest that your officials were corrupt.
Regarding the transparency of the project, you are reported in the Newsday of November 12 as pointing out that “the legislation under which the project was being executed contained provisions to satisfy the need for transparency” and that “the HDC held 17 consultations with tenants, businessmen, NGOs, private residents and religious leaders between February 5 and April 19 this year.”
We would be interested to know what this legislation is and the precise provisions therein to which you refer. Where consultation is concerned, there have unfortunately been several media reports of complaints by residents and businesspeople in the area of insufficiency in this regard. It has been further stated that such consultation as there has been took place only after the project had been announced and (a point hinted at by Mr Roberts) that it has not been all-inclusive.
So that, notwithstanding any laudable efforts made by you and your officials, there may still be for many the appearance of a lack of transparency in the project. This may have given rise to suspicions of corrupt influences at work. We are merely suggesting that these suspicions may have been shared by the persons on whose perceptions the CPI scores have been based.
The Newsday article of November 12 also reports that you have “raised questions about the businessmen who told Transparency International (TI) they paid bribes to politicians, political parties and senior public servants.” As we explained to the media at the launch of the CPI:
“The CPI is a composite index, putting together the results of surveys done over the last two years, not by TI itself but by international organisations such as the World Bank.
For Trinidad and Tobago, TI used the results of five surveys. Two of these surveys were done by the World Economic Forum (WEF) and one each by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), the Merchant International Group, (MIG) and the World Markets Research Centre (WMRC).”
Of these, it was the WEF in its 2005-06 and 2006-07 Global Competitiveness Reports that surveyed senior business leaders of domestic and international companies on their perception of the prevalence of undocumented extra payments or bribes connected with various government functions.
No one was asked to tell anyone about paying bribes to anyone.
You are quoted in the Guardian of November 9 as saying, “Today we are receiving a report from an international agency which seeks to rank our country against some yardstick of some pseudo-scientific subjective assessment of the perception of corruption...”
We would be very interested to learn the grounds for your description of the CPI as ‘pseudo-scientific,’ especially in view of the foregoing and especially seeing that the Index is used by international financial institutions such as the World Bank, by major regional groupings such as the European Union, and by potential investors across the world. In the material that TI has published on the 2006 CPI, on the question of quality control, it stated that:
“The CPI methodology is reviewed by an Index Advisory Committee consisting of leading international experts in the fields of corruption, econometrics and statistics. Members of the committee make suggestions for improving the CPI, but the management of TI takes the final decisions on the methodology used.”
The Express of November 9 reports that you have demanded a formal apology from us for what you say we said. Given what we have indicated above, we trust you will accept that there was no reason for you to have taken offence at our statements, and that therefore no apology from us is required.
We would however like to take this opportunity to suggest to you and, through you, to your Cabinet colleagues that close attention be paid to the views being expressed by many members of the public, and in newspaper editorials and articles, on what is perceived to be the significant and growing prevalence of corruption throughout the society. We further suggest that the government urgently take the necessary action, legislative and other, to address these concerns satisfactorily.
In this connection, the mega-projects mentioned above are not the only issues on which the government should be, and be seen to be, proactive. For example, the draft legislation on public sector procurement reform promised last year by the Prime Minister has not yet been laid in Parliament. Neither has there been any movement on the legislation on political party funding promised by former Attorney General Glenda Morean in April 2002. Nor has the government kept its public undertaking to publish details of its receipts of oil and gas revenues under the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI).
The media also report that you have thrown down – to anyone who claims to have evidence of corruption having taken place, a challenge to debate the issue. Since we have not made any such claim, there is clearly nothing for us to debate.
We enclose for your information copies of the material that we distributed to the media at the launch of the CPI and provided to both the Prime Minister and the Attorney General, among others. Misunderstanding notwithstanding, we are encouraged by your strong affirmation of the integrity and transparency of the East Port-of-Spain project. We hope that the 2006 CPI, although disappointing for us all, will spur all stakeholders, the Government, the private sector and civil society – to renewed efforts in the fight against the scourge of corruption. This letter is being copied to the media.
Yours sincerely
Reginald Dumas
Chairman
Trinidad and Tobago Transparency
Institute
