The Tribune

By KHRISNA RUSSELL

Deputy Chief Reporter

krussell@tribunemedia.net

ADMITTING to being a guardian angel to many people over the years, Official Opposition Leader Philip “Brave” Davis branded the EY audit into operations at the Water and Sewerage Corporation as nothing more than a “witch hunt” that has wasted taxpayers’ money.

On Wednesday evening, before tabling EY’s damning report of the water provider, its Chairman Long Island MP Adrian Gibson repeatedly suggested there was an “angel” in high places who ensured a company called Nassau Island Development not only received a hefty contract for work with WSC, but saw to it that certain rules were relaxed.

The report also uncovered that a woman by the same name as the secretary in Mr Davis’ law firm, Merlene Poitier, was a nominee shareholder of NID.

Mr Davis was at the time deputy prime minister and works minister.

Responding to these matters and others related to the audit yesterday, Mr Davis told reporters he only learned on Wednesday night that Mrs Poitier was a nominee shareholder of NID after the report was tabled in the House of Assembly.

Further, Mr Davis said he did not remember giving an order for WSC’s General Manager Glen Laville to authorise NID to receive an advance payment of $1.2m for work on the Gladstone Road Waste Water Treatment Plant, as outlined in the EY audit.

Apart from this he said the report was biased and seemed to suggest that there was something wrong with a minister, member of Parliament or otherwise making a recommendation for a company to receive state contracts. He went on to question the timing of the report’s tabling.

Despite the document’s completion months ago, it was just tabled this week as public concern for the $5.5bn Oban Energies deal proposed for Grand Bahama has spiked.

“I have been a guardian angel for many people and I can say I have been a guardian angel for many of those who sit right opposite me now. I’ve been their guardian angel,” Mr Davis said in the Minority Room of the House of Assembly.

Regarding his secretary being a registered shareholder of NID, the Cat Island Rum Cay and San Salvador MP said: “That was something new to me. I spoke with her last night and she indicated that she was a nominee shareholder in the company. You will note the company is a 5,000-share capital company; 4,999 being owned by Anthony L Ferguson and one share in her name, that she said she is a nominee as the corporate laws require that there be at least two named shareholders on a corporation to maintain the company.

“A nominee shareholder, most law firms in incorporating a company would use persons in the office to hold the shares on behalf of the beneficial owners,” he said. “It does not inure any benefit. No financial benefit. They just hold it as a trustee as it were on behalf of the beneficiary and it’s unfortunate.

“From reading the report it would appear that my firm had nothing to do with this corporation. It was formed by another law firm and then it moved from that law firm (to another).

“Now what would have been done had it come to my attention? I would have had to take that under advisement at that time.”

In an email, included in EY’s audit report, former WSC Chairman Lester Cox ordered the WSC to “make an advance payment” of $1.2m to NID. Mr Cox, in various emails, appeared irritated that senior officials questioned the requests.

In one email to Mr Laville he said: “We sat in the meeting at 10am with the JV and I am amazed that we are still discussing while the project is at a standstill. Maybe I did not make the minister’s request clear so I repeat. FACILITATE THE PAYMENT so that this project can come to a completion.”

But EY said: “WSC management resisted and explained the amount the contractor had been paid to date was substantially more than what was reflected in the construction progress and that making the advance payment would negatively impact WSC’s ability to manage the project.”

Regarding this Mr Davis told The Tribune: “My only recollection of a $1.2m advance was that at some stage during the course of the challenges between management and the contractor, management was suggesting the contractor had received payments that amounted to $1.2m and that they were not seeing the $1.2m on the ground. They consider that an advance on the contract.”

This newspaper then read a portion of the email to Mr Davis, however he maintained he did not remember, adding that there was no way he could know context of the email.

Mr Davis spoke to reporters after he raised the matter in the House of Assembly in the morning session.

He specifically took issue with his mother’s obituary being used as evidence in the audit report’s appendix to establish a relationship between himself and Mrs Poitier.

“Mr Speaker, the intervention by the member for Long Island highlights the concern of which I spoke yesterday and the egregious and faulty efficiency of the report because this is what they have done. This is what they did, disinterred the bones of my mother to make a point that’s what they did. And it is said that they did to connect Merlene Poitier to me. They didn’t need to do that. They didn’t need to disinter the bones of my mother to confirm that.

“All it required was a talk with me. That’s what makes the whole report support the supposition it’s all about a witch-hunt to smear and discredit without the input of others. This was not necessary.”

Earlier in the sitting, Mr Gibson told parliamentarians that he would not have included the obituary in the appendix of the audit report.