Daraine Luton, Staff Reporter

Pickersgill

People's National Party (PNP) Chairman Robert Pickersgill wants Prime Minister Bruce Golding to demand that Transport and Works Minister Mike Henry resign.

But Pickersgill has shied away from requesting the minister's head himself.

"If he is adhering to what he has said in his manifesto and the pronouncements that he has made about transparency and accountability and a drive to rid the country of corruption and more so that his administration will be corruption free, I ought not to be calling for the resignation of Mike Henry. He should do it!" Pickersgill charged at a PNP press conference on Monday.

Majority shareholder

Contractor General Greg Christie, in a report on the awards of contracts at the state-owned Jamaica Urban Transit Company (JUTC), held that Henry failed, in his responses, to explain the reasons for his belief that Douglas Chambers was not the majority shareholder in Simber Production Limited.

Chambers, as chairman of the JUTC, had awarded contracts to his company, a move Susan Simes appeared to have attempted to hide, four days after Chambers' murder, by altering company records to indicate that she was the majority shareholder.

Henry had come to the defence of Chambers after media reports claimed the chairman was the majority shareholder of Simber Productions. However, Henry has not said what evidence he had that led him to defend Chambers.

Pickersgill on Monday said he was giving Golding and Henry time to determine what action should be taken arising out of Christie's report.

"I am far from timid. The ball is in their court and I am watching it," Pickersgill said.

Meanwhile, Pickersgill has called for the resignation of the acting managing director of the JUTC, Bindley Sangster, and fellow directors Dennis Chung and Raphael Barrett.

"These persons ought not to carry out further any official duties. They have not lived up to the requirements of directors of a public entity," Pickersgill said, while noting that Christie found that they did not properly discharge their functions as members of the board's procurement committee.

The PNP chairman is lamenting that Chambers nearly received one of the country's highest national honours posthumously.

Less than honourable

Chambers has been characterised by the contractor general's report on the awards of contracts at the state-owned bus company as less than honourable.

"The contractor general apologised in the last paragraph (of his 104 page report) but well do I remember where this country was taken, almost an OJ," Pickersgill said.

Chambers was murdered by thugs in Spanish Town, St Catherine, outside the JUTC depot in June.

daraine.luton@gleanerjm.com.