The Tribune

By LYNAIRE MUNNINGS

Tribune Staff Reporter

lmunnings@tribunemedia.net

FREE National Movement leader Michael Pintard wants the Davis administration to disclose the terms under which Leslie Miller’s Summerwinds Plaza will be leased to house the Road Traffic Department.

Mr Miller confirmed the move after Transport and Energy Minister Jobeth Coleby-Davis acknowledged earlier this week that the department would move to a location on Tonique Williams Darling Highway next to Mario’s Bowling and Entertainment Centre.

Mr Pintard accused the PLP yesterday of “cronyism and favouritism”.

“Bahamians everywhere should recall that Mr Miller was already in deep debt to the Bank of The Bahamas for a sum reportedly well north of $20m,” he said.

“This debt was ultimately transferred to the Bahamian people through (Bahamas) Resolve once the PLP realised that it had to scramble to save the Bank of The Bahamas from the PLP-facilitated plunder of that bank.

“We have not forgotten how the approval of ill-advised loans to politically favoured persons by the bank’s PLP-appointed board ended up saddling Bahamian taxpayers with hundreds of millions of dollars when these bad loans had to be transferred to Resolve.

“The Bahamian people are only left to speculate if this is why Mr Miller was given the contract.”

“The opposition demands that the full terms of this agreement be published and that the public is assured that the entirety of any income generated through this arrangement goes first to settle the debt that Mr Miller owes to the Bahamian people –– any other arrangement would be untenable.”

Mr Miller’s long-time lawyer, Damian Gomez, pushed back on the idea that his client should not have his property leased because he owes the government money.

“If the government owes him rent which they have not paid,” he said, “how can the government say it is owed money by him?”

Mr Miller sued the government when the Minnis administration refused to honour leases the Christie administration entered with him, seeking more than $66m in damages.

Supreme Court Justice Cheryl Grant Thompson initially ruled that the leases were “valid and binding” and awarded him $9.846m in damages.

However, the Court of Appeal allowed the government’s appeal of the ruling and ordered the case be sent back to the Supreme Court for a hearing before a different judge.

The parties later agreed to negotiate a settlement without further legal action.

The Bank of The Bahamas and Bahamas Resolve are parties to the case. Mr Miller’s BOB loans –– secured by the plaza –– were moved to the bail-out vehicle when they became delinquent. He and his companies allegedly owe BOB more than $30.5m.

The Tribune understands that as settlement negotiations continue, the plaza is no longer under receivership, with the parties determining how Mr Miller’s account will be handled.

“The lease payments were to go to the bank,” Mr Gomez said yesterday.

“The government refused to pay. It paid a portion initially and then it stopped paying. That is the whole source of the disagreement. The bank was lending money for the purpose of the government getting the space that it was getting. It didn’t pay, so the basis of the bank’s arrangement collapsed because the government didn’t pay what it owed Mr Miller.”