Dawn Ritch, Columnist

Gordon 'Butch' Stewart has written a most ill-tempered and overlong response to a former junior minister. The latter pointed out that yet another of the former's employees had been elevated to a public position of influence.

It should be noted that a Stewart employee is president of the Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica. Another is president of the Jamaica Hotel and Tourism Association. And yet another, John Lynch, has just been made chairman of the Jamaica Tourist Board. On top of that, a well-known environmental agency is also a tenant of Mr. Stewart's, which effectively vitiates its independence as far as its landlord's interests are concerned.

This combination of influence is not just about owning a government; it's more like owning a country.

I am already on record expressing dismay over the appointment of someone from the private financial sector as Minister of State in the Ministry of Finance. When Danny Williams came from the private financial sector into the then government, he went in as Minister of Industry and Commerce, not finance. There is no comparison, therefore, between that appointment in the 1970s, and the one today.

The one today is potentially dangerous because of the conflict of interest that is engendered. And we have yet to consider the implications of the conflict of interest that arises out of Wehby's marriage to GraceKennedy Jimmy Moss-Solomon's daughter.

Privileged information

Even if private sector appointees don't give themselves contracts, no one should underestimate the enormous financial value of privileged information. With privileged information, there can be no level playing field.

Don Wehby came from remittances and foreign-exchange trading at GraceKennedy to find a perch in the Ministry of Finance. There are a number of locally owned companies besides GraceKennedy which operate in that area. Any one of them would give an eye tooth to see what passes over Wehby's desk at the Finance Ministry at any time of day, or be a fly on the wall in any meeting.

Wehby may be the most perfect person on the face of the earth, along with Christopher Zacca, Wayne Cummings, John Lynch and Diana McCaulay. All of them may be excellent people, but unfortunately, the situations in which they find themselves represent serious conflicts of interest.

Furthermore, I do not believe that mere employees of a company, no matter how senior, should become the presidents or chairmen of representational bodies in the public or private sectors. Those positions ought to be reserved for the owners of the means of production.

An employee or tenant is at the mercy of the employer or landlord. At best, they take instructions from them. Positions of trust require not only financial independence, but the confidence of being one's own master. Otherwise, we end up giving our landlords environmental awards even against the background of their company being accused of polluting the environment.

Had the new administration thought of making Butch Stewart himself chairman of the JTB, it would have occurred to them how unnerving this might be for the owners of the only other locally owned hotel chain in the island, not to mention the new foreign-owned chains to which he has been opposed. I am sure that if John Lynch did not share Butch Stewart's view he would not be working for him still, nor would Stewart be so quick to defend him.

Now that an employee of Stewart is occupying the post of JTB chairman, the situation can hardly be comforting. Tourism Minister Ed Bartlett cannot hope to convince anyone that his appointment is in the country's best interests.

Fig leaf of legitimacy

The appointment of a business baron's employee provides a fig leaf of legitimacy, no matter how tawdry. Nevertheless, there is not a person I know who would not prefer to talk to the real authority, rather than his or her proxy. At least you know who you're dealing with.

The others can be made to sit on boards of directors, but ought not to be permitted to chair them. At stake is the public interest. Better a chairman, therefore, who has something to lose, than one who can only lose his salary.

To have not one, but four of Stewart's proxies spread across government, and both the private sector and non-governmental organisations, is an exercise in the deepest cynicism. At least Stewart would represent himself, but all they can do is pretend not to do so. That at any rate, is inevitably how it will be perceived. It makes a mockery of the independence of all the bodies with which they are associated.

According to another newspaper: "In a lengthy statement which also defended Lynch, Stewart, who is also chairman of the Observer, said he was proud that the high achievers among the professionals employed to his group of companies, starting with himself, had been making themselves available to serve the country."

Is he setting up a defence for his own appointment? If so, it must be something awfully big. Stewart is no professional. He is just the right man in the right place at the right time and the right luck, with the right government willing to cut the right deals for his own advancement.

In that respect, he has every right to be contemptuous of the previous government for making foolish decisions. After all, they were the ones who advanced him millions of U.S. dollars when he owned Air Jamaica, without any obligation to pay back these loans. Even if he is not grateful for that fact, he is entitled to feel complete disdain for a government so gullible that they could have been convinced into making those loans in the first place.

These sorts of deals would probably still be continuing today, had there not been a falling out over the development and construction of the Sandals Whitehouse hotel. Good friends fall out over the simplest of things money.

Controlling the Caribbean

Butch Stewart has been accused elsewhere of interfering in the elections of St. Lucia, another Caribbean island. With this fuming response of over 2,000 words, to what is a reasonable observation, he opens himself up to the charge that he is trying to control Caribbean governments.

Here in Jamaica, there is a new government in place. One can see the tentacles of the Stewart organisation reaching out to engulf, entwine and control.

Could this be an attempt to make them the right government with the right Prime Minister at the right time for the right man in the right place to recoup election funding and expenses?