During the three days of work, meetings were held with representatives of the Office of the Contractor General, the Integrity Commission, the Commission for the Prevention of Corruption and the Office of the Auditor General, in order to obtain objective and complete information and reveal potential difficulties in the implementation of the Inter-American Convention.

The team also met with representatives from the Attorney General’s Chambers of Jamaica, the Public Service Commission and the Access to Information Unit in order to obtain information on the implementation of the recommendations that were formulated by the MESICIC to Jamaica in the First Round, pertaining, among other issues, to the prevention of conflicts of interest and post-employment restrictions; systems for registering income, assets and liabilities of public servants; and the legal regime for access to information.  

The team also had the opportunity to meet with civil society and private sector organizations in order to obtain their perspectives on the progress made in the fight against corruption.  

The results of this visit forms part of the review process for the Fourth Round that is currently being carried out by the Committee of Experts of the MESICIC, which will conclude with the adoption of the Jamaica country report by the Committee at its Twenty-Fourth meeting to be held in September 2014, in Washington DC at OAS Headquarters.

The MESICIC is a cooperation mechanism between States, with the participation of civil society organizations, established within the framework of the OAS, in which the legal/institutional framework of each country is reviewed for suitability with the Inter-American Convention against Corruption as well as the objective results achieved therein. The incorporation of on-site visits as a stage and integral part of the MESICIC review process represents an innovative and pioneering initiative in the context of the OAS, especially for a peer review mechanism and the importance of the issues it addresses.