MPs ‘blank’ anti-bobol body

Asked to support a global anti-bobol watchdog, none of six local Members of Parliament present raised their hands. This was the scene yesterday after Global Organisation of Parliamentarians Against Corruption (GOPAC) chairman and Canadian MP, John G Williams, urged local and regional politicians to set up a Caribbean chapter of the international support network. This occurred in an aside to a four-day conference  of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA) at the Hilton Trinidad. Inaugurated in 2002 in Canada, the group monitors corruption, parliamentary oversight and effective governance. Williams, chairman of  the Standing Committees on Public Accounts of Canada’s House of Commons, said GOPAC worked with MPs to boost their Parliaments’ role as the legislature and thereby fight corruption.

He said wherever destitution existed — such as lack of clean water, housing, healthcare and women’s rights — you would find a government that was corrupt, and in turn wherever you found a corrupt government, you would find a parliament ineffective in holding them accountable. But GOPAC could help parliamentarians make governments accountable. “Parliament is an institution — its role is to hold Government to account.” For example, he said, despite governments signing conventions against corruption, these were merely lip-service unless confirmed as domestic law. GOPAC, he explained, backed existing conventions against corruption, such as that declared by  the Organisation of American States (OAS). “So GOPAC is not just a talking-shop. We are an umbrella organisation of self-governing regional chapters supporting clean, specific, measurable processes. Pressure works.”

Williams said GOPAC was supported by the OAS, World Bank, CPA, Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), British Department for International Development, and soon likely the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). Members of Upper and Lower Houses, Government and Opposition and Independent, could join GOPAC as individuals. “Membership is of parliamentarians.” He asked those present whether they desired to form an interim steering committee to set up a Caribbean branch of GOPAC. While parliamentarians from six Caribbean countries gave support — Anguilla, Barbados, Caymans, Guyana, Jamaica, and Turks and Caicos — none of our local MPs raised their hands. PNM MP for San Fernando West, Diane Seukeran, said they should be given more time to study GOPAC’s literature. Opposition Senator, Wade Mark, told reporters he would have to first ask his party.