And the Prime Minister will also move with haste to appoint the Integrity Commission. As viewers are aware, the difficulty, according to the Prime Minister, has been that none of the chartered accountants wanted to serve as the Chairman because they become politically exposed persons. Once that happens, the chairman and their entire family will be subjected to invasive background checks. Without that chairman, the commission cannot be properly constituted.

Estrella Chan, who works at the Commission told us earlier this week that this very important office, which acts a check and balance to corruption in public life, has been inactive for 6 years now, since the late Bernard Q Pitts, left the chairmanship in 2010. Well, last night after negotiating with the teachers, the Prime Minister has committed to reactivating it as early as next month.

He explained in detail why his Government requires that much time to do so:

Rt. Hon. Dean Barrow - Prime Minister
"It will take some doing for the process to be completed. When all that consultation is over and the Governor General is advised by me to sign the instruments of appointment the senate must still approve the persons to be appointed. So it will take as I said some doing in terms of the time required to ensure that we rigorously follow with the procedures set out in law but we expect that all that should be done so that the integrity commission can be in place by November 14th."