PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, CMC -The Integrity Commission of Trinidad and Tobago (IC) Tuesday said it “notes, with concern,” a statement made by Prime Minister Dr. Keith Rowley regarding its work.
Rowley told the Trinidad Guardian newspaper over the weekend that the IC was “deliberately attempting to tarnish my reputation” after he had been informed that he is the subject of another investigation, making it the third time in his political career that the IC is investigating him for allegedly breaching the Integrity in Public Life Act (IPLA).
The probe is the second since Rowley became prime minister in 2015.
“The Integrity Commission, acting in concert with others, is deliberately attempting to tarnish my reputation by trying to find ways to associate me with contracts and awards that I have had absolutely nothing to do with.
“The Commission, on its own volition, it says, will re-open an investigation into my involvement. This is a grand fishing expedition, hoping to slander me by associating me with contracts with which I have had absolutely nothing to do,” Rowley told the newspaper.
In a November 23 letter to Rowley, the IC informed him of the probe “arising from the award of contracts to Mr Allan Warner and companies with which he is affiliated or associated and has an interest therein.
“Please be advised that the Commission has therefore found it necessary to investigate whether the government contracts awarded to Mr. Warner and companies with which he is affiliated or associated have been granted in conformity with, among other things, adherence to your obligations and responsibilities under the act. Especially after the acceptance of the gift,” the IC wrote.
Rowley said that after he received the letter, he passed it on to his attorneys, who responded to the IC.
“It is my view that in the most incomprehensible of ways, the Commission, in attempting to generate something here, has based its actions on specifically four contracts identified by the Commission. Two of these contracts were not made by Warner, and the other two are contracts awarded in Tobago by the autonomous Tobago House of Assembly,” Rowley said.
But in its statement, the IC said it has a constitutional duty “to ensure transparency in decision-making.
“In discharging that duty, the Commission may be required to ask questions of persons in public life, such as the Honourable Prime Minister, about the role that he may have played in making certain decisions.”
The Commission “has never dealt with anyone in discharging its constitutional duty.
“It must be understood that answering questions about the role that one may have played in making certain decisions comes with the territory when persons enter public life.
“ While it is perhaps understandable for persons in public life to feel concerned or even irritated when asked to answer questions about the role that they may have played in the making of certain decisions, it is irresponsible to allow that concern or irritation to drive them to make accusations of collusion or mischief based on nothing more than the mere fact that they have been asked to answer questions,” the Commission said.
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