JAMAICA-Opposition wants legislators under the Integrity Commission probe named.

KINGSTON, Jamaica, CMC – The main opposition People’s National Party (PNP) and the founding Director of National Integrity Action (NIA), Professor Trevor Munroe, are calling for the six legislators under investigation for illicit enrichment to be named.

PNP President and Opposition Leader Mark Golding, speaking at a PNP National Executive Council meeting in Trelawny, northwest of here on Sunday, said: “I have been calling on the prime minister (Andrew Holness) to disclose who those persons are so that appropriate action can be taken by them, or by him if they are not willing to do so.”

He said the six parliamentarians should also “step back until those matters are resolved. “Thus far, we have heard nothing from him on the matter, apart from a vague comment that he has asked far and wide and hasn’t heard anything,” said Golding, adding, “I, therefore, use this opportunity to repeat the call to the prime minister to disclose who these six persons are, and to every one of them to do so if the prime minister is not willing to do so.”

Golding said the legislators should “do the right thing and step back from whatever positions you hold until your names are cleared or otherwise through due process.”

Last month, the Prime Minister said he hasn’t received an indication that anyone in his ruling Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) is linked to illicit enrichment investigations.

“I have asked as far and as wide, and I haven’t got that response from everyone, but as far as I have been told, no,” Holness told reporters, adding, “People have been written to, as the Integrity Commission does almost daily, but I have not heard of anyone in my political party being written to for this matter of illicit enrichment,”

Meanwhile, Munroe, speaking on Radio Jamaica’s show, ”That’s a Rap,” called on those legislators under investigations to follow House Speaker Marisa Dalrymple Phillibert, who last week announced that she would quit Parliament after the Integrity Commission ruled that she be charged for making a false declaration to the public body.

“Those six, we don’t know if they are in positions where they could influence the Parliament decision as to whether and how far as some members are proposed to weaken and dis-empower or take away some of the power of the Integrity Commission.

“They could be sitting on the Integrity Oversight Committee, for example. So I think that former speaker Dalrymple Phillibert, for example, certainly strengthens the precedent and the positive tradition of our Parliament that persons being investigated ought to step aside from any influence within the Parliament,” he added.

Munroe said that in the case of the former speaker, she chose to resign, adding, “What this is that those six who know themselves they ought to immediately recuse themselves from any position in the Parliament that can influence public funds, the allocation of public funds…”

Munroe urged the Integrity Commission to “expeditiously” complete its probe.

Golding told party supporters that the decision by the former speaker to resign her position, as well as being the Member of Parliament for Trelawny Southern, was an indicator that integrity had been upheld in the Jamaican Parliament.