The Tribune

SUSPENDED National Insurance Board director (NIB), Algernon Cargill, has accused Shane Gibson of bypassing transparent tendering processes to award contracts to Progressive Liberal Party (PLP) supporters.

The allegations concerning the minister of labour and national insurance were contained in a letter sent by Mr Cargill to Dr James Moultrie, NIB’s current chairman, ahead of his meeting with the Board of Directors to discuss the findings of the recent Grant Thornton forensic audit.

The letter was also copied to Prime Minister Perry Christie and Mr Gibson.

The document alleges that Mr Gibson both interrupted existing tender processes, and issued instructions, requiring NIB to purchase products and services from an agent that supplied PLP election material during the 2012 general election.

Mr Cargill also alleged that Mr Gibson issued instructions to prepare a plan where all NIB contracts “subject to public tender” would not be advertised, but instead awarded to “select” engineers, quantity surveyors and other contractors.

Lambasting the audit report on NIB, Mr Cargill wrote: “The Grant Thornton forensic report did not conclude the Minister’s intent to cancel the NIB transparent process for awarding service contracts for security services, air-condition maintenance, plumbing, elevator maintenance, janitorial services etc., and instead award these contracts to companies that were deemed loyal to the Minister or the PLP. “NIB previously awarded these contracts without any political input to the vendors that provided the most comprehensive, and competitive tender through NIB’s public tender process and the tender exercise for these and similar services was always open to the entire public via public advertisements in the newspapers.

“Instead, vendors are being ‘selected’ to respond to the tenders, and the vendor who currently provides these services to NIB now considers that their contracts may be cancelled because of a change in government and not because of any concern about the service they provide.”

And Mr Cargill also expressed “shock” at being advised that NIB’s human resources committee and Mr Gibson, following his suspension, “again arbitrarily approved salary increases and promotions for nearly 200 NIB employees that were deemed PLP loyal in December 2012”.

Mr Cargill alleged that salary increases had already been awarded under NIB’s industrial agreements, and these payments fell outside of these arrangements.

“This arbitrary measure of additional promotions and salary adjustments, in all cases, was ultra vires to the Industrial Agreement and documented human resources policies,” Mr Cargill alleged.

“It was surprising at the rather unorganised and confusing way that the names were advanced for salary adjustments and, in most cases, we learnt from the two executives managing this process on behalf of Minister Gibson that employee X was a Campaign worker for Candidate Y, and similar comments.

“Both unions accepted these promotions to the dissatisfaction of the majority of their members, and this entire exercise still appears to be an issue of major discontent within NIB as some of the employees not promoted or who did not receive salary adjustments fear that they were victimised.

“Productivity and morale is said to be at an all-time low as staff members search for the rationale for the promotion exercise and question why they were not promoted. The cost to NIB of this promotion exercise exceeded $500,000 per annum.”

Mr Cargill’s allegations are likely to further raise the temperature in what has become a heated battle over his suspension from NIB last year.

They raise fresh questions about whether the Bahamian people, the ultimate beneficiaries of NIB’s social security system, are getting true value for money from the services/contractors that NIB is purchasing.

And the letter’s allegations also highlight how politically-led interference is detrimental to efficiency within key government corporations.

Mr Cargill, in his letter to Dr Moultrie, expressed surprise that the Grant Thornton audit did not examine several actions initiated by Mr Gibson.

Detailing his complaints, the suspended NIB director said: “Minister Shane Gibson directed that NIB not go through a tender process to purchase 30 Ipads for the Board of Directors and executive management team, and instead, procure these directly through an agent that procured PLP paraphernalia for the 2012 general elections, Nybor Investments/Robyn Smith.

“In fact, Gregory Moss had advised the Board of Directors that the Ipad acquisition was only to be purchased from the vendor (Nybor Investments/Robyn Smith) recommended by Minister Gibson. The vendor simply purchased the duty free items from Best Buy and added a substantial mark-up to the purchase.”

Nybor and Robyn Smith again featured when Mr Cargill alleged that Mr Gibson “interrupted the final stage of producing a purchase order for the printing of NIB Prescription Drug Plan Manuals that was awarded to American Printing Arts......”

Mr Cargill claimed that after receiving quotes supplied to NIB for the cost of printing, Mr Gibson “directed this job to Nybor Investments/Robyn Smith, whose price was marginally below the quotations received from American Printing Arts, the recommended bidder”.

Mr Cargill expressed further concern that Mr Gibson had allegedly directed the sale of a still-functioning NIB vehicle, a 2005 Toyota Yaris, “without a tender process” to an Abaco-based employee who was the spouse of a former Bahamas Communications and Public Officers Union (BCPOU) colleague of the minister’s.

“I am advised that he [Mr Gibson] was very troubled that this employee, the survivor of a former union colleague, had no transportation and had to walk/hike to work in Marsh Harbour,” Mr Cargill wrote.

“He collaborated with two NIB employees to provide this NIB vehicle to the employee, as a gift from him, on the understanding that one of the two employees pay for the freight of the vehicle from Nassau to Abaco, and the second pay for the insurance.

“For the ‘gift’ vehicle, I am advised he provided cash to [NIB executive] Theresa Burrows to conclude the purchase...... NIB employees are concerned that this vehicle was provided outside of the NIB tender process, and also outside of the process NIB uses to sell fleet vehicle to employees.”

And “even more alarming”, Mr Cargill called on Mr Gibson to explain why he directed the NIB Board to award the construction contract for the Blake Road-based JL Centre to Ran Mar Construction, even though the $8.879 million price was the same as that offered by Coastline Construction, which had already won the tender bid.

“Minister Gibson was also fully aware that Ranmar did not bid on this job, that they did not provide any costing or analysis that this job could be completed by Ranmar for Coastline’s price, who Ranmar’s sub-contractors were, and/or any normal due diligence that was associated at the time with NIB’s tender process,” Mr Cargill said.

The suspended NIB director added that he felt he was having to defend his, and his family’s reputation, against “the entire Progressive Liberal Party” despite them having been its lifelong supporters.

“My father was buried on March 9, 2013, with his PLP Stalwart Councillor medallion on his neck, and my oldest brother is currently an active Progressive Liberal Party stalwart councillor,” Mr Cargill wrote.

“My entire family that is resident in Yamacraw had publicly declared their support for Melanie Griffin over the many years she has represented the Yamacraw constituency, where I am also resident, until these attacks started on my name and that of my family.”

Agreeing that his political affiliation had “no relevance” to the current NIB situation, Mr Cargill added: “This matter is not a political matter, and politicians should allow the courts or the parties involved to determine the final outcome and stop using the public resources available to further defame my name and that of my family.”