Robinson will make a good PAC chairman
Many eyebrows were raised when Opposition Leader Mark Golding appointed former General Secretary of the People’s National Party Julian Robinson, MP, as spokesman on finance... except mine.
Robinson flopped as general secretary of the PNP, and there will come a time when he will reflect and hopefully realise that he was merely wasting his time in that role. He may even realise, too, that when he was being cricitised about his stewardship as general secretary by myself and others, he should have taken it with sincerity and honesty, instead of thinking that personal agenda swords were being drawn.
Nevertheless, Robinson may now have found his true calling, that of shadowing the finance portfolio and serving as Public Accounts Committee chairman. He is no dunce. He is honest, understands the business of financial accountability and knows well enough that the people have a right to be told how the money that they contribute to the budget, in terms of taxes, is spent.
Protecting the public purse is critical at this juncture of Jamaica’s history, more than at any other. One of the things I would like to see happen, hereafter, is for the reports coming out of the Auditor General’s Department to be taken more seriously than they have been over the years. So many breaches have been cited by the AG, yet, the requisite sanctions do not seem to be applied.
Robinson can become a martyr of sorts, if he pledges, and acts upon his word, to become Parliament’s crusader against corruption. He has time to do it. His head should be clearer, too, now that he has got rid of the millstone around his neck called general secretary of the PNP.