The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

and NATARIO McKENZIE

Tribune Business Reporters

The former sports minister said “every penny can be accounted for” just 24 hours after asserting he was “not interested in talking crap” over the National Sports Authority (NSA) audit.

Dr Danny Johnson, who held ministerial responsibility for the NSA for the majority of the period covered by the auditor general’s report, performed a rapid about-turn one day after telling Tribune Business he was “no longer in public life” and did not wish to comment on the findings.

Contacted by this newspaper last Thursday, hours after the document was tabled in Parliament, Dr Johnson said he “did my best” while in office and that the Auditor General’s report made no findings or allegations of impropriety against himself or others.

Asked if he wanted to respond to the specifics, especially the Auditor General’s revelation that Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG), the global sports and entertainment giant, was paid $1.2m by taxpayers on the NSA’s behalf for nothing, Dr Johnson repeated “no comment” three times in his brief reply.

“No comment from me,” he said. “I’m in private life now. The work I did, I did my best. There’s no impropriety by anyone in that report that I can see. I have no comment. I’m not interested in talking crap about what we did for the sports brand. No comment.”

His stance changed rapidly in less than 24 hours, though, given Dr Johnson’s appearance Friday late afternoon on the radio show, The Hit Back with Nahaja Black, on Star Guardian Radio 106.5 FM.

He accused critics of damaging the Sports in Paradise brand, launched under the former Christie administration, due to a lack of understanding and vigorously defended the work of the NSA under his watch.

“Our Sports in Paradise brand is one of the most successful launches of a synergistic brand ever in the world of sports and entertainment. We took on the largest sports and entertainment company in the world,” said Dr Johnson in reference to AEG.

The auditor general’s report referred to an entity, which it labelled as “Company A”, as having received $1.192m “for services that were never performed”. While it named none of the companies or employees referenced in its findings, Tribune Business’s research established irrefutable proof that “Company A” is none other than Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG).

This newspaper’s archives record the signing of AEG’s management and consultancy deal with the NSA as occurring on Friday, May 22, 2015. The Auditor General’s report states that NSA’s agreement with “Company A” was agreed on May 22, 2015, making the dates an exact match.

The report said none of the “ten deliverables” AEG was supposed to accomplish on the NSA’s behalf was ever completed, even though the sporting and entertainment giant received $468,000 in payments direct from the Ministry of Finance.

AEG has ownership interests in multiple professional sports teams, including the Los Angeles Galaxy soccer team that once featured David Beckham, the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team and Los Angeles Kings in ice hockey.

It is also involved with European-based soccer and ice hockey teams, and owns sports, entertainment and convention facilities across the world. These include the Staples Center in Los Angeles, home of the Lakers, and PlayStation Theatre in New York, while AEG also promotes multiple music festivals such as Coachella.

Dr Johnson dismissed the “deliverables” claim, saying: “This is where the auditor general is wrong in his assessment. How did we get IAAF [Relays] three times in a row? How did we get FIFA to the table with beach soccer? How did we get the NCAA in the Bahamas; the only country outside the US certified to hold any NCAA sport? How did we hold Carifta swim, judo and track and field in the same year and made a profit?”

He added: “We delivered for five years without stopping. We had deliverables in the contract to deliver content, management, get the facility ready.”

Dr Johnson touted the various accomplishments under his tenure as sports minister, arguing that he had “one of the smallest budgets of any minister” which therefore forced him to rely on taxpayer funding from the Ministry of Finance for capital improvements and events preparation. “Bahamians need to come back and tell me if we got value for money,” he said.

“Stop complaining about what I didn’t do. See if you could do what I did. Check my budget allowance. We were oscillating between $12-$15m, and 70 per cent of our budgets go to salaries and emoluments. If Mr Bastian feels there are things untoward, that’s fine. I can answer those questions. Every penny can be accounted for.”

No financial statements have ever been produced, though, to show whether any events staged at the NSA’s facilities have turned a profit. LeRoy Archer, the NSA’s former chairman who held office for much of the period covered by the Auditor General’s report, was last week quoted as saying he objected to the AEG report without explaining why.

Tribune Business’s records show this was not the only deal Mr Archer opposed during his tenure. This newspaper reported in October 2014 revealed his and the NSA’s concerns over the terms of the contract with the Bahamas Bowl organisers.

Documents obtained by this newspaper revealed that, despite NSA objections, the contract with Conference USA, the Bowl promoters, had given away 100 per cent of the event’s most valuable income streams for he entire six-year period covered by the deal.

These are the TV, radio and all media related rights, potentially a multi-million dollar income stream that could have financed the National Sports Authority and removed it from the Government’s ‘subsidy list’.

Sponsorship and advertising rights for the games, which are contracted until 2019, have also been made the exclusive preserve of Conference USA, despite pleas by Mr Archer that these revenues should be shared.

Mr Archer had pleaded for the deal to be changed in a letter to Dr Johnson on May 13 that year, unaware that the latter’s permanent secretary, Calvin Balfour, had signed the deal six days’ earlier.

Overall, the response to the Auditor General’s NSA report from those responsible for its management and oversight at the time has been largely to run for cover or fail to answer any of the questions raised.

The Auditor General’s NSA audit detailed the all-too-familiar issues with a state-owned enterprise (SOE) - lack of taxpayer “value for money” on funds spent; political interference; inadequate controls; the absence of proper procedures, especially on procurement and contract tendering; poor transparency and accountability; and breaches of both its own Sports Authority Act 2011 as well as the Financial Administration and Audit Act.