The Tribune

By RICARDO WELLS

Tribune Staff Reporter

rwells@tribunemedia.net

BAHAMAS Electrical Workers Union (BEWU) representatives yesterday suggested the government was attempting to “cover up” the roles some employees at Bahamas Power and Light allegedly played in the vendor fraud scheme by “picking out” portions of the Ernst & Young audit report.

During a contribution in the House of Assembly yesterday, Works Minister Desmond Bannister indicated several of the BPL employees who facilitated a scheme to defraud the company of nearly $2m were exonerated by the report.

The Carmichael MP thanked the “vindicated” employees for their years of service and said he looked forward to many more years of continued “productivity and goodwill”.

Mr Bannister highlighted five of the 11 employees yesterday.

In direct objection to his comments, BEWU Secretary General Astrid Bodie questioned how such a case could be made.

“I cannot sit back and allow this message to stand as is, I don’t care how it is written, carried or heard; I am calling a spade a spade. If they are guilty in any way, just how the line staff were called in to meetings and given their walking papers, (these other employees) should have faced the same treatment,” Ms Bodie told The Tribune.

Referring to three employees connected to the Accounts Payable Department, two of which were named by Mr Bannister Wednesday, Ms Bodie said the Ernst & Young audit report detailed how the trio directly oversaw the submission, vetting and printing of 44 cheques.

The Ernst & Young audit in its ‘Invoice Approval and AP Process’ section does name the three workers and indicates the trio “printed the fraudulent cheques”.

“It says it here in black in white,” Ms Bodie said. “Their names are listed one, two, three; so how could the report name them and then you get up in the House and talk about them being vindicated? How in the world does that happen?

“I have respect for the minister but this is wrong,” she maintained.

BPL’s cheque system calls for clerks to produce invoice orders for payment and submit them to a superior.

Once submitted, managers are expected to review individual cheques and validate them.

Once done, those cheques are then passed on to BPL’s Accounts Payable Dept.

Ms Bodie continued: “If we are going to clean house, let’s clean house.”

She added: “This isn’t about politics here. This is about doing what is right across the board and not picking out what you want to make a big deal about.”