Attorney-General Basil Williams has dismissed the Private Sector Commission’s (PSC) concerns over the proposed state assets recovery legislation as politicking, while saying that the legislation is based on the international convention against corruption that was signed on to by the last government.
Williams made the comments on Wednesday while responding to recent statements by the commission, including that the draft State Assets Recovery Agency (SARA) bill was premature and redundant since many of the intelligence gathering mechanisms have already been enacted in the anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism legislation. It also voiced concerns over what it says is the threat to civil liberties presented in the bill.
“The provisions in the [legislation] are not pulled out from somebody’s back pocket. The position is…the last regime had signed on to the Convention Against Corruption, as they had signed on to other conventions, and never implemented them. The international community now is demanding that if you want to be amongst the members of the community and be involved in the community, you gotta comply with all these conventions that you sign,” he said, while adding that the last government ignored the provisions of the convention.
