Remarks by FNM Chairman Carl Bethel

The Acklins road contract signed under the PLP administration was not stopped by the FNM government, but was stopped before the FNM came to office because of internal and legal disputes between its joint venture contractors; one of whom who had no experience in road construction, FNM Chairman Carl Bethel has revealed.

THE CHAIRMAN: You would have heard reference to the comments made by the Prime Minister that the road to Salina Point contract was one of those contracts that is referred to by the Opposition as stop, reviewed and cancelled.

Well, the fact is that that was a road contract that was already stopped before the Free National Movement came in, by virtue of a serious dispute between the contractors; a joint venture between a company called M&R Construction Company Ltd., and Caribbean Asphalt Ltd. They had fallen out before the coming into office of the Free National Movement.

Evidence of that is contained in a letter, and I have here documentation, that have been produced and filed and/or are ready to be exhibited in a trial – a case that was commenced by the M&N Construction Company Ltd.

First of all let me say that the principal owners of the M&N Construction Company Ltd., are two local Acklins Island residents.

And Caribbean Asphalt Ltd., is a New Providence-based company owned by [the principal], who is quite well known as someone who is involved in actually working with asphalt and tar.

What is interesting is that [the principal of Caribbean Asphalt], in a letter addressed to the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Public Works on August 18 first of all denied in a number of letters that he was a co-plaintiff in the matter with the M&R Construction Company Ltd., which sued the Minister of Public Works and the Government in respect of that contract.

The key point about this letter is that in the letter addressed to the Permanent Secretary and that is a matter that is before the court, this is what he said about the road contractors:

“Despite their name, M&R road builders was a novice company with regards to road building headed by [the principals]. Both men were residents with private businesses in Acklins. Not only did M&R fall short in equipment, its principals had absolutely no road building or asphalt paving experience prior to this arrangement. Our instructions from the Ministry of Public Works was to, ‘show M&R road builders how to construct roads’.”

The letter also states: “Our first and only contract under the former government administration was in 2006 at which time we were instructed by the Ministry of Public Works to JV (joint venture) with a company called M&R road builders to carry out road construction in south Acklins.”

So we have a clear assertion by a partner to the road building contract that eventually was reviewed and cancelled upon conclusion of the review, that he was instructed by the Ministry of Public Works to enter into a joint venture in 2006 to pave roads in south Acklins with a company owned by two residents of Acklins who did not know anything about how to pave roads.

The joint venture agreement between the parties in the documentation also, according to the statement of [the principal] of Caribbean Asphalt Ltd., ended contentiously in March of 2007. It was not until June of 2007 that the Ministry of Public Works, after review, gave notice of intention to cancel the contract.

The critical thing is this – that a prudential government has to act prudentially. When we came to office, we met a very strange situation with the Acklins road. The contract was a contract that, on its terms, was for a period of one year. By the time the Free National Movement came into office, eight months of that one-year period of time had elapsed. More than $300,000 had been paid to the contractor, but only 1% of the work foreshadowed in the contract had been performed – eight months into a one-year contract.

The contract had ground to a halt because of their internal disputes so the Free National Movement did not stop it technically, we reviewed it, we saw the circumstances and we cancelled it – acting prudentially in the best interest of the Bahamian people.