Opinion
- Editorial
Jamaica Gleaner:
Paying
the price for Trafigura
Editorial
The decision by the ruling People's National Party
(PNP) to give back the $31 million 'gift' from Dutch
commodity traders Trafigura Beheer and the resignation/firing
of the party's general secretary and Information
Minister, Colin Campbell, are clearly aimed at limiting
the political fallout from the scandal.
Mr.
Campbell, obviously, is paying the price for what
is deemed ineptitude in his structuring of the deal,
leaving the Government open to credible claims of
corruption and kickbacks. For, while we suspect
that Trafigura's statement that the cash was in
furtherance of a commercial transaction was partly
to appease European regulators, its effect is to
imply shady dealings on the part of Jamaican government
ministers and others close to Prime Minister Portia
Simpson Miller.
Internally,
the Trafigura scandal immediately does two things:
It weakens the popular and populist Mrs. Simpson
Miller and strengthens the position of the Peter
Phillips wing of the party. Dr. Phillips was Mrs.
Simpson Miller's closet rival for the job of party
leader and prime minister during the PNP's leadership
contest in February. After Mrs. Simpson Miller's
victory, Dr. Phillips' supporters felt that they
were being sidelined while the Portia yellow brigade
made an arrogant march to ascendancy. Mr. Campbell
and the Energy and Commerce Minister, Phillip Paulwell,
were seen to be among the ascendant group.
Now
Mrs. Simpson Miller is willing to sacrifice Mr.
Campbell and, according to PNP insiders, Mr. Paulwell,
too, came close to feeling the axe, the duo having
been deemed to have made a hash of this party financing
issue, which was handled with the counsel of senior
PNP vanguard.
Mrs.
Simpson Miller and party elders, including former
Prime Minister P.J. Patterson, will hope that the
Trafigura issue will, rather than reopen the wounds
caused by the leadership race, pull the PNP closer
together, causing it to hunker down and famously
win a fifth consecutive term in office. An electoral
victory had seemed more than a possibility after
the PNP's recent big annual conference, at which
Mrs. Simpson Miller's great charisma and popularity
were highlighted.
Whatever
the internal impact, the PNP leader should not assume
that the fall of Mr. Campbell and the maintenance
of the sword of Damocles over the head of Mr. Paulwell
will be sufficient to satisfy the electorate. Nor
does giving back the cash to Trafigura.
She
needs to do more.
First,
she must order that the Petroleum Corporation of
Jamaica (PCJ) cancel its agreement to trade the
oil received by Jamaica on concessionary terms,
no matter how above board and rewarding PCJ says
the agreement has been. People must be assured that
Trafigura did not bribe its way to that agreement.
Second, she must turn the issue of the payment and
the controversial bank account over to the police
Fraud Squad for investigation.
If
Mrs. Simpson Miller was serious in her declarations
that she depends on small donors for her election
campaign, which would make the Trafigura issue an
aberration, she should, ahead of any law regulating
party financing, open a register of PNP contributors
and lay it bare to public scrutiny. If, indeed,
there is nothing more to hide.
The
Prime Minister must also fast-track discussion and
legislation on the issue, bearing in mind that is
not only foreign companies that seek to pay for
influence.
Jamaica
Gleaner is one
the most important news daily in Jamaica, since
1834.
.Petroleumworld not necessarily share these views.
Editor's
Note: The preciding article was publish by the Jamaica
Gleaner, on Monday, October 9th 2006. Petroleumworld
reprint this article in the interest of our readers.
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Petroleumworld 10/15/06
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