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alexk
Guest
One of the candidates for the position of Commissioner of Police, Wayne Hayde, is now questioning whether there was a “breach of confidentiality” from person or persons associated with the Police Service Commission (PSC) or KPMG which gave Gary Griffith an “unfair advantage” over other candidates, constituting a breach of right to “fair and equitable treatment.” And he is now calling on PSC chairman Bliss Seepersad to “conduct an urgent investigation” into the matter.
Failure to investigate, Hayde said, could undermine public confidence in the PSC.
Giffith’s nomination for the job of top cop will be debated by the Parliament on Monday.
But Hayde, through his attorney Fulton Wilson and Company, sent a letter to Seepersad detailing what he felt were the instances which gave credence to his claim of breach of confidentiality.
He drew Seepersad’s attention to several articles and reports in the media relating to the nomination of Griffith for the CoP post, including a newspaper front page headline that the ‘Hunt is Over- Gov’t to Approve Gary Griffith as new Police Commissioner.’
The letter, dated July 24, noted that while Hayde was not aware that the PSC had submitted another name after Williams for the post of CoP to the President and “bearing in mind our yet unresolved complaints to the PSC,” their client had concluded based on comments made by Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley during the debate on the nomination of Deodat Dulalchan that the next candidate was Griffith.
During that debate, Rowley had revealed the initials D,H,S and G.
According to Hayde, based on the fact that the first names of the three candidates rejected by the Parliament so far correspond to the initials given by the Prime Minister, he had concluded that the initial G stands for Gary Griffth, “especially since Mr Glen Hackett (first initial G) was deemed by the PSC not to be a viable candidate due to his age.”
The letter contended that the latest information in the media represents a “continuing pattern of confidential leaks” which “furthers the interests of Mr Griffith and defeats the legitimate interests of our client and other candidates.”
It pointed to Griffith’s pre-action protocol letter to the PSC reported in the T&T Guardian under the headline, “I was the Top Candidate,” in which he stated: “This attempt used by the PSC to have my points altered from 81.94 per cent, after I was graded by experts in the field...to then have the PSC conduct their own biased process and drop me over 23 per cent using a system that they wanted to get their own result...”
Hayde said the comments relating to the outcome of the selection process was being viewed as a “serious breach of confidentiality.”
It also pointed to a CNC3 report on June 7 in which Griffith stated that the PSC “threw him out of the top five” and thirdly to an interview on a radio station in which Griffith attributed “sources” as providing him with the confidential information relating to his scores and placement in the selection process.
Hayde, through his attorney, is contending that the confidential information released by Griffith into the public domain could only have come from “a person or persons associated with PSC/KPMG, since this was given prior to the debate in Parliament.”
He is contending that Griffith used the information “to further his own interests and build public support for his nomination and selection of CoP.”
The letter noted “such an advantage had not been given to our client and therefore constitutes a breach of his right to fair and equitable treatment.”
Hayde has requested that the PSC “conduct an investigation into the breach of confidentiality,” and “to take appropriate action to remedy the harm done to our client.”
Failure to properly address the matter, the letter stated, “will not only prejudice the rights of our client, but will also undermine public confidence in the ability of the PSC and or the office of the CoP to receive and retain confidential information.”
Only this week, Seepersad herself expressed concern to the T&T Guardian about the amount of information in the public domain on the process.
On July 18, Hayde, through his attorney, sent Seepersad, as chairman of the PSC, a pre-action protocol letter making a case for his name to be included on the merit list after he was deemed to be not viable because he was aged 60. Hayde contended that age was not a factor in the two interviews which he did, neither was it a criteria in the advertisement inviting applications for the job of CoP.
The T&T Guardian understands there had been a response from the Commission acknowledging receipt of the letter, but there has been no further communication from the PSC to Hayde.