Jamaica’s First Corrupted Politician
Materials on the 1951-1952 & 1953-1954 court cases were obtained from the Jamaica National Archives and the Gleaner Archives. Parliamentary hearings mentioned on this episode were source from the Parliamentary Library at Gordon Horse and the National Library of Jamaica.
In arguments of the best political party in Jamaica, the recurring theme of corruption will always be brought - which party is most corrupt. So to understand the root of political corruption on the island, it seems to fit to look at the politician who started it all - J.Z. Malcolm, who in 1951 became the first politician in Jamaica to face legal charges over corruption. The Early Years
Joseph Zachariah Malcom was born in the community of Knockalva, Hanover in 1892. After finishing secondary school, he end up studying at the Mico University College. By 1917, he was out of school and spent the next twenty years teaching at several primary schools including, Gurney’s Mount and Jericho schools in Hanover, Duanvale in Trelawny and Mearnsville in Westmoreland. In the 1940’s, he made the shift from teaching to politics. In 1944, he ran as an independent in Jamaica’s first ever election after adult suffrage, where he successfully beat out of three other candidates to win the seat of Hanover Eastern. One of four other independents to win a seat in that year’s election, Malcolm won 2604 votes on the ballot, 33.5% of its totality, where his closest challenger was the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) candidate, Greville Ribton Levy, who won 2,209 votes. However by the late decade, Malcom was now a member of JLP where he represented the party in the 1949 general elections. And just like the previous election, he won the seat beating out of three other candidates. This time he won 3,770 votes, 44% of its totality, where the next best results was the People’s National Party (PNP) candidate, Winsbert M. Grubb. Seeing as JLP would win 17 out of 32 seat on offer - they would form the government where Malcom was tapped to replaced J.A McPherson as Minister of Education.And it is in these two roles, Member of Parliament for Hanover Eastern and Minister of Education, that J.Z. Malcom would be in when Jamaica’s first political corruption scandal went down. The Crime
In November 1951, it was announced that a government minister was selling farm workers call cards. In the simplest form, farmwork call cards are an application process which allow persons take part in overseas farm work; for Jamaicans it, usually the U.S. and Canada. Who gets access to this application, however, is determined by the Ministry of Labour and Social Security but most importantly, it is not for sale. It has never been for sale. As such, news of a government minister involved in this scheme, raised many eyebrows. To note, at this time the public did not know who was this minister in questioned. By the end of the month, then opposition leader, Norman Manley, raised the issue in parliament seeking clarification on the investigation to which the Minister of Finance and General Purposes, Sir Harold Allan, stated that the “government is not aware of the existence of any evidence which would justify the institution of criminal proceedings against him”. But as history would have it, in just a manner of days, the public was made aware that there was indeed evidence against the investigated politician. A December 03, 1951 article published by the Daily Gleaner, stated:“On Saturday morning, the Hon Joseph Z. Malcolm, Minister for Education, was arrested by C.I.D. chief Superintendent David Chase and charged with conspiracy to defraud a number of persons. The charge follows police investigations into reports of malpractices in the distribution of call cards for United States farm workers… Malcolm was arrested at his office at the Education Department on Saturday morning”.
Arrested alongside Malcolm was his wife, Ellen and one of his associates, Victor Graham. Trial Outcome
The trial got underway in early 1952. Eyewitness testimonies would tell how Malcolm and his associate underground business worked. A February 22 Gleaner article, “Farm Card Case: Witnesses Tell Court They Paid” stated: “Violet Vacianna told of accompanying Wing and Foster Johnson to the home of the Malcolms and of having paid £6 to Mr. Malcolm for her son Wing, to get a call card”
On another testimony, the Gleaner reported: “David Williams also gave evidence about a £14 payment to Mrs. Malcoln and £7 which he said he had paid to Mr. Malcolm to obtain a ticket”
Days later on March 18, in the Spanish Town Court House, all three persons were found guilty of four counts for conspiracy to defraud and conspiracy to effect a public mischief in connection with farm workers’ tickets. Malcolm was sentence to two years of imprisonment while his wife was bound over to be of good behaviour for two years. Graham, on the other hand, was sentenced to eighteen months of imprisonment. When passing his judgement to Malcolm, His Honour, A. C. V. Graham stated, “Joseph Malcolm, it gives me great regret to come to this conclusion because your act brings disgrace not only on you but on all of us - everybody in this courtroom and outside of it.”
In the wake of his imprisonment, Malcom was swiftly replaced in his ministerial position. On March 25, Malcolm position as Minister of Education was revoked by the House of Representatives. It was the first time in Jamaica’s history, under the 1944 constitution, that an elected member was removed from the executive council. Malcom ministerial post was replaced by Lester L. Simmonds. On the matter of Malcolm’s position as a member of parliament, the opposition, PNP, would stress the need to have the now jailed MP to be replaced. By August, Will O. Isaacs raised a motion for the Hanover Eastern to be declared vacant. With this, Malcolm would filed two summonses to continue holding his seat and his validity as a voter. In January 1953, a judge quickly dismissed the summonses. By April, Malcolm was officially disqualified from the House of Representative by the courts where he was discontinued from holding his Hanover Eastern seat. According to Justice MacGregor, his arrest made him not eligible to have his name placed on the Voter’s List.Upon his release from prison, Malcolm went back to teaching where he kept a private school in Richmond Hill, Montego Bay. In 1959, he fell ill and died on August 15 at Kingston Public Hospital.Legacy
In the years that followed Malcolm’s conviction, other politicians would face the courts over criminal charges. For almost two years later on November 11, 1953, Lester. L. Simmonds, the man who replace Malcom as Minister of Education, was arrested for selling state secrets. Months later on July 23, 1954, Simmonds and a Gleaner reporter, Vincent Truman, were convicted on two counts under the Official Secrets Act where Simmonds was sent to prison for 15 months. With these two political scandals dominating the news headline, PNP stressed the criminal cases of both Malcolm and Simmonds in their 1955 general electoral campaign. This would play a major role in bringing the party to victory - their first general electoral win under the 1944 constitution. It also influence the “Sweep Dem Out” slogan in that year’s election which the PNP still use to this day. By the 1960’s, Arthur Burt, minister of state in the Ministry of Education, faced the first major allegations of corruption in independent Jamaica. This had to do with his handling of the World Bank financed school building program in 1966. When a commission of inquiry was done into the program handling, the report stated: “Suggestions of a grave character were made involving Dr Burt personally”. But before he could appear before the commission, Burt fled the island to the United States. By 1990, J.A.G. Smith, a former minister of labour in the 1980’s, was charged with conspiracy to defraud farm workers and sentence to five years in prison at hard labour. Almost 15 years later in 2006, the PNP would be embroiled in a global anti-corruption scandal when a questionable $31-million donation by Dutch oil-lifting firm Trafigur was donated to the party. That scandal played out in the Dutch courts. Then in 2008, Kern Spencer, former state minister in the energy ministry, faced corruption charges in relation to missing lightbulbs donated by the Cuban government as well as monetary irregularities in the distribution of said lightbulbs. In 2014, he was freed of all charges.In 2019, Minister of Education, Youth and information, Ruel Reid was removed from his post over reports of corruption, nepotism and misappropriation of public funds within the ministry as well as its agencies, including Caribbean Maritime University. That matter is currently been played out in the courts. Recently, the St Catherine Municipal Corporation was raided as a part of multimillion-dollar fraud probe. And in the midst of all of this, there are the many politicians who have resigned when faced with corruption, public funds mismanagement and government interference allegations based on reports and official investigations. In the last 30 years, these cases includes: Then, minister of Mining and Energy, Horace Clarke who resigned in December 1991 over a scandal that saw a waiver of $29.5 million in duties that Shell Company West Indies should have paid to the Government on gasoline imported into the country. The then Minister of Finance, PJ Patterson also resigned and in a new Cabinet shake up weeks later, Patterson, was noticeably missing. However, he would return to the cabinet in March 1992, this time as Prime Minister.Then in April 2002, Dr. Karl Blythe who resigned as minister of wake and housing when a report claim that he interfered in the day to day management of Operation PRIDE and flouted guidelines. The policy was the government initiative to alleviate squatting by allowing low income groups to get access to housing at affordable prices through government subsidies.In July 2009, State Minister in the Ministry of Transport and Works, Joseph Hibbert resigned after he was named in a corruption investigation by officials from the United Kingdom. The issues involved Hibbert tenure as chief technical director of the ministry in the 1990’s.In November 2011, Mike Henry, in his capacity as Minister of Transport and Works, resigned following reports that over $60 million was spent on furniture and a further $102 million in refurbishing the office of the National Works Agency.In 2013, Richard Azan has Minister of Transport, Works and Housing resigned following reports of improper construction of shops on land owned by the Clarendon Parish Council. Still, he was reinstated months later when the Office of the Director of Public Prosecution stated no criminal charges would be filed.In 2018, Andrew Wheatley resigned as energy minister, when the auditory general released a report that detailed widespread abuse of power, poor governance, corruption, bullying, nepotism and misappropriation of public funds at Petroleum Corporation of Jamaica.In July 2020, JC Hutchinson was stripped of his duties as Minister of Industry, Commerce, Agriculture and Fisheries, after reports came out that Hutchinson helped his partner's company get the approval to manage the lands. According to the Gleaner, ‘2,400 acres of state-owned lands located in Holland, St Elizabeth, are being managed by a company of which Hutchinson's partner, Lola Marshall-Williams, is a director and shareholder’. Hutchinson's son was also operating a company, Holland Farm and Garden Supplies, on the property. In the wake of the situation, Hutchinson apologies to the Jamaican public and was reassigned to the Office of the Prime Minister.
And yet persons have issues with these resignations and lack of prosecutions that have become the norm in Jamaica’s politics. As then head of the National Integrity Action, Dr. Trevor Monroe told the Gleaner in August 2019: “For over 30 years, resignations have been followed by ineffective investigations, few prosecutions and only one conviction. This deficit cannot be allowed to continue. It is essential to arrest the decline in public trust; in still public confidence that high-level, politically connected individuals, where there is evidence, will serve prison time, as the minister of labour did 30 years ago”
In recent years, there have also been government officials who have breached the Integrity Commission Act and Parliament (Integrity of Members) Act. In 2011, member of parliament and former government minister, Anthony Hylton, was accused of failing to say on his statutory declarations, that he was a director in a company he did not disclose. His case, which began in 2014, has stalled in the Jamaican court for years. In September 2023, Marissa Dalrymple-Philibert resigned as Speaker and as Member of Parliament for Trelawny Southern, with immediate effect. This was due to charges relate to breaches of the Parliament (Integrity of Members) Act and the Integrity Commission Act, connected to the purchase of a 2015 Mercedes Benz on concession but which she omitted from her statutory declarations for six years. In a statement she declared the incident, a “genuine oversight”. Almost a year later in November 2024, she was back as MP for the Trelawny Southern after a by-election. In February 2025, she was fined $900,000 after pleading guilty to breaching the Integrity Commission Act. In 2024, government senator and a former Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Leslie Campbell was found guilty for failing comply with repeated requests from the Integrity Commission, the island’s only anti-corruption watch dogs for public officials, for additional information about his statutory declaration spanning several years. He was fined $400,000 in April 2025.Then, there are the countless other corruption allegations and conflict of interest by Jamaican politicians who have never faced any legal or career repercussions. Still, in looking back at its legacy, Malcolm’s 1951 scandal serves as reminder of how the country’s hold politician accountability and its lack there of in the 21st century. The case is also was one of the first foundation that was laid for Jamaicans distrust in the nation’s politicians - a problem subsequent governments have made worse by facilitating, downplaying, attacking anti-corruption agencies and watch dogs as well as playing a blame game when its come to political corruption on the island. As Protoje sings on his 2017 track, Blood Money: “Was 'bout to be a politician too
Maybe den I coulda mek any decision, look
Maybe den I'd mek a hundred million disappear
Then mi act like mi nuh care
Watch you vote mi back in dere
Because the sad reality
Inna Jamaica, say yuh status a yuh salary
Man deh road a carry one whole heap a felony
But them have a family a boost up the economy
So…
Police cancel operation
'Cause nuh real bad man nah go station
Now if you check the situation
A blood money run the nation
Come tek a look inna Jamaica
Injustice in the place now
If what you see no really faze you
Then you a the problem that we face too”