The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

Attorneys for the airport tenant targeted by the Minister of Tourism yesterday said she had paid $5 million in rent over the past five years, and never received "favourable consideration" from any government.

Wayne Munroe QC told Tribune Business it was "erroneous" for Dionisio D'Aguilar to claim that Patricia Mortimer's rental settlement with the Nassau Airport Development Company (NAD) had been influenced by political favouritism.

Responding to Tribune Business on behalf of Mr Mortimer and her PatMor Group of Companies, Mr Munroe described his client as "very put out" by Mr D'Aguilar's attack and the potential impact on her business reputation.

He added that she was "most upset" by the fact that all information relating to her dealings with NAD was readily available to the Minister, yet she appeared to be the victim of a politically-motivated address.

Wayne Munroe QC, who was Mr D'Aguilar's Freetown opponent as the PLP's general election candidate, said it "would be useful and helpful" for the Minister to correct the remarks made about his client.

Mr D'Aguilar, during his Budget debate address, had alleged: "Mr Deputy Speaker, there is a large tenant who operated five stores in LPIA. How she got five stores in the first place is mind-boggling to me, and reeks of an 'all for me baby' policy adopted by someone, sometime ago.

"Anyway, Mr Deputy Speaker, as soon as the government changed in 2012, this tenant stopped paying rent, and by the end of December 2016 owed NAD $3.3 million. I am told that every effort that was made by NAD to collect this money was rebuffed by direct intervention by the political directorate telling NAD to back off and stand down."

He added that $1.2 million of the $3.3 million receivable was written-off by the NAD Board under the Christie administration, with the remaining balance to be paid over time, in return for giving up one store.

The Minister's clear inference was that Ms Mortimer had obtained a 'sweetheart deal' due to her connections to the then-governing Progressive Liberal Party (PLP).

Mr D'Aguilar's comments ignited a firestorm of controversy, but nothing had been heard from Ms Mortimer until Tribune Business's e-mail to her prompted Mr Munroe's response on her behalf.

Hitting back at each of the Minister's allegations, the QC charged that while all other existing Lynden Pindling International Airport (LPIA) tenants were 'grandfathered' into leases in the new terminal buildings, Ms Mortimer had to bid on a Request for Proposal (RFP) to retain hers.

"Any suggestion that my client received any favourable consideration from the PLP government or any government in the award of the leases her group of companies operate is erroneous," Mr Munroe told Tribune Business.

"The first point is that the leases for the news agents were the subject of a competitive RFP process in 2009 when the FNM was in power. Our client was made to compete for the lease of four locations, notwithstanding that everyone else - apart from the restaurant lease acquired by Mark Nabbie - was grandfathered.

"Our client had previously operated news agent in the NIA (old airport), but was made to compete while other existing tenants were simply awarded leases," he added.

"The next point is that the RFP was for four stores together as a unit. It was a 'winner of the RFP takes all four stores'. There was therefore nothing sinister about our client ending up with those four stores."

Mr Munroe then explained how the $1.2 million 'write-off' related to another LPIA tenant, whose obligations Ms Mortimer had inherited after she provided a guarantee to back them.

"Tyrone Nabbie's Kafe Kalik trademark restaurants won the restaurant leases, and he opened his trademarked restaurant," the QC wrote to Tribune Business.

"Our client, having guaranteed certain obligations of Mr Nabbie's company, was forced to step in when Mr Nabbie fell into arrears with his rent.

"Our client took an assignment and transfer of Mr Nabbie's shares in his company," Mr Munroe added. "She was made to pay a sum in the low to middle 'six figures' as arrears on Mr Nabbie's operation. It is to be noted that $1 million of the arrears said to have been owed by our client is in relation to arrears from Mr Nabbie's operations before our client took over.

"The assignment and transfer of the shares, and the payment towards the arrears, was finalised in January-February 2012 when the FNM was still the Government of the Commonwealth of the Bahamas.

"It can therefore be seen that the our client's interest in all of the locations operated in LPIA was acquired under the FNM, and not the PLP."

Mr Munroe then refuted Mr D'Aguilar's claims that PatMor had paid no rent at LPIA since 2012, saying: "The records of NAD would show that our client has paid approximately $5 million in rent over the last five years. It is difficult to understand how this fact could have not been known."

He then explained that the $2.1 million 'balance' of the $3.3 million receivable cited by Mr D'Aguilar was a 'disputed sum', relating to rental payments for which Ms Mortimer believed she was over-charged.

Mr Munroe said his client felt she was paying almost four times' as much as other LPIA tenants, and explained: "NAD started calculating our client's rent as 38% of gross revenue [profit] based on a projection of a throughput of 3.8 million travellers. The actual throughput fell far short of the projections and our client filed a complaint with NAD.

"NAD agreed to revisit the matter and negotiations followed. For context, NAD was at this time charging other tenants at a rate of 10 per cent of gross profits."

Mr Munroe said Ms Mortimer sought equal treatment for her stores, and "NAD eventually agreed that it was so after protracted negotiations. In the meantime they had continued to charge rent at 38 per cent of gross profits.

"At all material times our client paid rent at the rate of 10 per cent as it understood applied," he added. "NAD added interest on the difference and, together with that difference, this accounts for the sum said to be owed as arrears.

"It should be obvious that there would be no reasonable justification for NAD discriminating by charging our client rent at a rate almost four times higher than everyone else."

Mr Munroe, on Ms Mortimer's behalf, declined to comment further on the settlement agreement due to "legal and contractual restraints". However, he added that the explanation for the former Board's actions by then-chairman, Anthony McKinney, was "consistent" with their position.

Mr Munroe emphasised that Ms Mortimer was honouring the settlement agreement with NAD, and emphasised that her primary concern was the damage done to her business reputation by the controversy.

"She was very put out by it," he told Tribune Business. "What she finds most unattractive is that the information was readily there.

"She's continuing to move on. The reputational thing in a small, vicious little country like the Bahamas takes longer to subside and be forgotten. From a business perspective, she's going ahead doing business.

"It would be useful if Dionisio came out and at least corrected what he said. That would be useful and helpful."

Mr Munroe said he was prepared to give the Minister "the benefit of the doubt", suggesting he may have been given misleading, inaccurate or incomplete information on PatMor's arrangements with NAD.

However, he criticised the practice of MPs and Ministers using the protection afforded by Parliamentary privilege to attack persons and companies who were not present to defend themselves.

"Personally, I find it disturbing that Ministers of the present Government see it fit to attack private citizens and companies in the House of Assembly where they have the benefit of absolute privilege from actions for defamation,"Mr Munroe said.

"I have always understood that the ethics of Parliament abhorred that practice, as the individual has no ability to respond or defend himself."

He urged the media to treat such attacks "with the proverbial bucket of salt unless the allegations are repeated outside of Parliament".

"You might be interested to note that Desmond Bannister's rant about the contractors contracted to construct the sea wall at Smith's Point is riddled with a lot of the same obvious inaccuracies,"Mr Munroe argued.

"For instance he asserts, that the contractor had no experience in constructing sea walls when the contractor, as far as I am aware, has built all of the sea walls in Grand Bahama contracted by the Bahamas Government.

"In fact, the same contractor built sea walls between 2007 and 2012 when Mr Bannister was a member of the Cabinet. In fact, the contractor was represented by Kwasi Thompson, the current FNM Minister, in an issue over compensation for works."