AUDLEY SHAW, the Jamaica Labour Party's (JLP) spokesman on Finance yesterday called for the immediate release of the Auditor-General's audit of the island's postal services.
Mr. Shaw who is also chairman of Parliament's Public Accounts Committee said Minister of Commerce, Science and Technology, Phillip Paulwell, should insist that Permanent Secretary, Dr. Jean Dixon, release the report to the public. "There is no further reason to hold this from the public," Mr. Shaw said. If the report is not released during the course of the week, Mr. Shaw said he would be tabling questions in the House of Representatives next week aimed at forcing the Minister's hand.
Mr. Shaw made the comments following a report in yesterday's Gleaner that Auditor-General Adrian Strachan had found no evidence that former Central Kingston MP Ronald Thwaites had attempted to defraud the postal services of millions of dollars. The Auditor-General, who was called in to audit the operations of the Post and Telecommunications Department last July, told The Gleaner that he submitted his findings to Postmaster-General, Dr. Blossom O'Meally-Nelson, and Dr. Dixon several months ago.
Mr. Strachan was requested to do the audit after reports emerged that Mr. Thwaites, an attorney-at-law and Roman Catholic deacon, had converted cheques which he collected on behalf of the
Post and Telecommunications Department. "There is no evidence based on what we saw that fraud was involved," Mr. Strachan said in an interview. "But, obviously, errors were made by the lawyer (Mr. Thwaites) in how the thing was lodged."
Mr. Thwaites found himself entangled in controversy last year following reports that a senior PNP official had fraudulently converted $5 million collected by his law firm on behalf of the postal services.
Although he was not named, Mr. Thwaites appeared on the Nationwide news programme on Power 106 radio station on June 27 to defend himself. He admitted that the $5 million was deposited to his company but said this was done in error. He also confessed that another cheque collected on behalf of the Post and Telecommunications was lodged to his account. He subsequently resigned as MP for Central Kingston, while other allegations of financial impropriety surfaced.
