Ke­jan Haynes

The In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion has pub­lished an ex­ten­sive list in the Dai­ly Gazette of per­sons in pub­lic life who are in breach of the In­tegri­ty in Pub­lic Life Act for fail­ing to file De­c­la­ra­tions of In­come, As­sets and Li­a­bil­i­ties and State­ment of Reg­is­tra­ble In­ter­ests forms.

The list de­tails names of those with out­stand­ing de­c­la­ra­tions for the years be­tween 2014 and 2021 who had not yet filed up to Jan­u­ary 19, 2023.

Those names in­clude sev­er­al mem­bers of Cab­i­net, the Op­po­si­tion bench and In­de­pen­dent sen­a­tors. There are Per­ma­nent Sec­re­taries, mem­bers of Ser­vice Com­mis­sions, Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tions, Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ties, State Boards and mem­bers of the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly.

Among the more no­table names are Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ters Stu­art Young, Pene­lope Beck­les, Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly, Mar­vin Gon­za­les, Stephen Mc Clashie, Bri­an Man­ning, Symon de No­bri­ga, Kei­th Scot­land, Paula Gopee-Scoon, Allyson West, Ran­dall Mitchell, Don­na Cox and Has­sel Bac­chus.

On the Op­po­si­tion side, Jear­lean John, Jayan­ti Lutch­me­di­al, Damien Ly­der, David Lee, Dr Roodal Mooni­lal and Di­nesh Ram­bal­ly were list­ed.

“For the pe­ri­od of 2014 to 2021, the names of eleven mem­bers of the Cab­i­net were pub­lished as fail­ing to file their de­c­la­ra­tions and state­ments of reg­is­tra­ble in­ter­ests,” the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion said in a post on its web­site.

“Re­gard­ing par­lia­men­tar­i­ans, the names of 33 Mem­bers of Par­lia­ment were pub­lished as fail­ing to file their de­c­la­ra­tions and state­ments of reg­is­tra­ble in­ter­ests.”

The Com­mis­sion said for the year 2021, all re­quests for ex­ten­sions re­ceived were grant­ed but ex­ten­sions can­not be giv­en for more than 12 months from the due date of fil­ing.

In some cas­es, there were peo­ple who failed to file de­c­la­ra­tion forms who are no longer part of pub­lic life.

The In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion is al­so re­quired to pub­lish the list of non-com­pli­ant mem­bers in dai­ly news­pa­pers stat­ing its in­ten­tion to take ex-parte ac­tion, fol­low­ing which, the Com­mis­sion would then pro­ceed to file its ac­tions be­fore the High Court.

“Af­ter pub­li­ca­tion, the Com­mis­sion has not­ed an in­crease in com­pli­ance with re­gard to the fil­ing of de­c­la­ra­tions and state­ments of reg­is­tra­ble in­ter­ests,” it not­ed on the web­site.

Guardian Me­dia un­der­stands the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion has vary­ing de­grees of en­force­ment de­pend­ing on the sever­i­ty of the breach.

On one hand, it may come with a warn­ing.

One per­son whose name ap­peared on the list said yes­ter­day that they were called and told a warn­ing let­ter would be de­liv­ered to them. Once that let­ter is de­liv­ered, the per­son in breach can go in­to the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion to go through the process of shoring up their sta­tus to en­sure they are in com­pli­ance. They could al­so go to the Com­mis­sion with­out the warn­ing let­ter in hand.

In more se­vere cas­es, Guardian Me­dia un­der­stands peo­ple are warned of a po­ten­tial court or­der stat­ing they have to file im­me­di­ate­ly or they will have to pay $3,000 with­in 30 days, and fail­ure to do so could re­sult in a larg­er fine of $150,000.

Ac­cord­ing to the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion, the to­tal num­ber of per­sons in pub­lic life sub­ject to pub­li­ca­tion was 595. The Com­mis­sion sends an oblig­a­tion let­ter to those en­ter­ing pub­lic life, ex­plain­ing their re­quire­ment to file de­c­la­ra­tions and state­ments of reg­is­tra­ble in­ter­ests.

In its New Year’s Mes­sage re­cap­ping the year 2022, the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion said it took a ze­ro-tol­er­ance ap­proach to the non-fil­ing of de­c­la­ra­tion forms.

The com­mis­sion filed 1,592 court or­ders to chase 2,772 ex-parte ap­pli­ca­tions for out­stand­ing De­c­la­ra­tions and State­ments of Reg­is­tra­ble In­ter­ests. Some 521 court or­ders were served and 37 ap­pli­ca­tions were sent to the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions for those who didn’t com­ply with the court or­ders last year.

Fol­low­ing are some of the more no­table per­sons list­ed as in breach:

(Gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials)

Stu­art Young

Pene­lope Beck­les

Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly

Mar­vin Gon­za­les

Stephen Mc Clashie

Bri­an Man­ning

Symon de No­bri­ga

Kei­th Scot­land

Clarence Ramb­harat

Paula Gopee-Scoon

Allyson West

Ran­dall Mitchell

Don­na Cox

Has­sel Bac­chus

Lau­rel Leza­ma-Lee Sing

Yokym­ma Bethelmy

Muhammed Yunus Ibrahim

Imam Sher­az Ali

Ndale Young

Au­gus­tus Thomas

Har­vey Bor­ris

(Op­po­si­tion)

Jear­lean John

Jayan­ti Lutch­me­di­al

Damien Ly­der

Tim Gopeesingh

Renu­ka Ramb­ha­jan

Teron Mo­han

David Lee

Dr Roodal Mooni­lal

Ravi Rati­ram

Di­nesh Ram­bal­ly

(In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tors)

Paul Richards

De­oroop Teemal