Witness Protection bills for next sitting of National Assembly

By Jarryl Bryan

The sitting of the National Assembly slated for Thursday, January 18th, will see further delay of several motions coming from the Parliamentary Opposition. Instead, the draft Witness Protection and Protected Disclosures bills will feature.
According to the Order Paper, these pieces of legislation will be moved by Attorney General Basil Williams. It states that the Protected Disclosures Bill 2017 will create a Protected Disclosures Commission that will be tasked with receiving and investigating claims made by whistle-blowers in regard to improper conduct by public officials.

The document states that the Protected Disclosures Bill will “combat corruption and other wrongdoings by encouraging and facilitating disclosures of improper conduct in the public and private sectors, to protect persons making those disclosures from detrimental action.”
The draft Witness Protection Bill, on the other hand, had contained a slew of new measures designed to deter the leaking of information which compromises those the Witness Protection Programme protects. Those measures include stiff penalties — such as 10 years in jail for bribery.
Part VI of the bill also binds anyone, including participants or former participants of the programme, from disclosing information in relation to the programme; or face the penalty of a one million dollars’ fine and 10 years in prison.

According to Section 20 (1), this law applies to anyone who, without lawful authority, reveals information about the identity or location of someone who participated in the Witness Protection Programme, which can compromise their safety.
Anyone who discloses information which compromises the integrity of the programme also commits an offence. In the case of participants, one does not even have to be part of the programme for the proviso to apply.
Section 20 (2) stipulates that someone who underwent assessment to be considered for inclusion into the programme is barred from revealing his/her participation. He/she also cannot provide information as to the modus operandi of the programme.

Witness protection
But the coalition Government’s commitment to witness protection has been under fire in recent times. A nurse who was attached to the West Coast Berbice hospital was transferred with immediate effect in 2016 after she made complaints against a councillor from A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change (APNU/AFC).
The nurse had complained that the councillor had been going to the hospital for an excessive daily dose of the painkiller ‘Pethidine’. The nurse had said she was targeted by the regional administration.
The nurse, who filed complaints twice in 2016, said she refused to administer the 100 ml dose to the councillor, who would turn up daily to receive it. She claimed she received a letter of transfer after she was scolded for going to the media with her complaints. Some two days later, the councillor also reportedly resigned from her post and the party.
Late last year, it was reported in sections of the media that the nurse still remained in a transferred status, despite the brouhaha in the media and the first reading of the Witness Protection Bill.
And while this bill will be read, Opposition motions to revoke Value Added Tax (VAT) on education, for the Auditor General’s office to conduct a forensic audit on the Georgetown Municipal Council, and on the controversial parking meter contract remain in limbo. They have, in fact, been in that status for so long that the 2018 budget was in the meantime read, and VAT on education removed. In addition, the parking meter contract is in the process of being renegotiated by a special committee at City Hall.