( l - r ) Paulwell, Llewellyn, Spencer

QUEEN'S COUNSEL K.D. Knight, yesterday, at the start of the corruption trial of Kern Spencer, painted a picture of the former junior minister being given an underserviced motor vehicle to execute a Herculean task.

Spencer is on trial with co-accused, Coleen Wright.

Knight, while cross-examining Phillip Paulwell, former minister of industry, technology, energy and commerce (MITEC), suggested that the Cuban light-bulb project had been implemented in an "ad hoc way".

Paulwell told the court that in hindsight, Spencer should have been given a bit more guidance. He also said that the budget allocated to the project was insufficient, and that he had demanded certain results, which meant increased implementation costs.

Corruption breach

Spencer and Wright are charged jointly with breaching the Corruption Prevention Act and the Proceeds of Crime Act. The charge arises out of their involvement in the imple-mentation of the now, infamous Cuban light-bulb project, which cost $276 million to implement. Both are accused of benefiting improperly from the project. They have pleaded not guilty.

Paulwell told the court that he would get updates on the project but, aside from that, he had had nothing else to do with it. He said he wrote to the Petroleum Corporation of Jamaica (PCJ) for it to make $30 million available for islandwide implementation. He also said the PCJ was the implementing agency.

However, under cross-examination from Knight, his colleague, People's National Party parliamentarian, Paulwell, said he recalled the cost for the implementation of a pilot phase in east Kingston and Port Royal and east rural St Andrew being about $7 million.

He agreed with Knight that, at an average of $3.5 million per constituency, it would have cost approximately $210 million to implement the project.

"You provided approximately one-ninth (of the true cost)," Knight suggested, to which Paulwell responded that he was correct.

Paulwell said Spencer was given ministerial responsibility for the project because he thought he could handle it. Noting that the project had not received Cabinet approval, which is the norm in government-to- government relations, Paulwell said that, in hindsight, such approval should have been sought.

Earlier, the defence signalled that it would be moving to get two lawyers out of earshot of the proceedings as they would be called as witnesses.

Patrick Atkinson, who is representing Spencer, said he believed Richard Small and Heron Dale, who represented Rodney Chin - who is now a Crown witness - might have material relating to the case. Atkinson said the subpoenas would be served on them today.

Atkinson also asked that Director of Public Prosecutions Paula Llewellyn recuse herself from prosecuting the case and instruct the Attorney General's Department to take the matter on. He said she, too, might be called as a witness.

However, Llewellyn told the court that any suggestion or innuendo that she had not fully discharged her duties in terms of disclosure was "extremely frivolous and at best, a naked and vulgar attempt to make me recuse myself from the matter".

The defence is claiming that Llewellyn, Dale and Richards have knowledge of how Chin moved from being an accused to a Crown witness.

daraine.luton@gleanerjm.com