"Madness in SPORTT": Minister Roberts

Minister of Sports on Friday revealed in Parliament what he called "madness" at the Sport Company of Trinidad and Tobago (Sportt), which won the contract for the controversial $2 million national flag at the National Stadium.

Anil Roberts said the company received confirmation of the award from Sportt prior to even being recommended for the job. He said the information is contained in an audit from the finance ministry.

He gave an example of extravagance by Sportt’s executive chairman and director. He said they leased two BMW X5’s at a cost of $40,000 monthly although they had travelling allowances.

“Errors, omissions, impropriety and downright corrupt practices... from the Caribbean Games, which never came off, to the legacy flag at Hasely Crawford Stadium, to the hiring of interns, the leasing of expensive SUVs, duplication of duties/responsibilities and the creation of a ghost roof at the stadium,” Roberts said about the “damning” report.

He said auditors have recommended that "all breaches of good governance be further investigated".

Speaking superficially on the flag issue, Roberts said there was no Sportt tenders committee but on May 4, 2009 a note recommended a certain company for the award of the project.

However, five days before that, in a letter dated April 29, 2009 the recommended company acknowledged receipt of the contract.

Roberts said the person who made the award of the flag contract had no authority to bind the company. And with regard to the execution of the contract Roberts said the company was supposed to use 200 cubic metres of concrete but used only 30 cubic metres.

He said there were other serious discrepancies between what was supposed to be done and what happened.

Roberts also spoke of $55 million allocated for the upgrading of sporting facilities for the 2009 Caribbean Games that had to be cancelled cancelled because of the Swine flu scare.

“Of the $50 million of works undertaken in preparation for the games, some $30 million were ‘awarded’ to contractors without the use of the tendering process...Of the $30 million of works done and supplies/services executed without the use of the tendering process, $20 million of those transactions were via the use of single quotations,” Roberts told MPs.

He said Sportt conducted 129 transactions, totalling $57.3 million by single quotation. “For the Caribbean Games alone, spanning mere months, over 379 transactions were conducted by Sportt to the tune of $65.3 million,” he said.

He said only $25 million were awarded through the tendering process although none of it was approved by a tenders committee.

“The report states no evidence was available to suggest a tenders’ committee ever existed prior to March 2010, prior to commencement of the audit,” the minister said.

He claimed that PNM appointees at the company had the “audacity to send 62 notes relative to the award of those contracts to a ghost committee.”

He also said Sportt had received 37 applications from interns in 2009. However the eight who were hired never applied, he said.

Sportt's former executive chairman Kenneth Charles and its former director Darren Millien have denied the claim of rampant corruption. And they have defended the lease of the exensive BMW's.

“We realised that because there was a need for managers and engineers to be on the field at all times for key decisions on major contracts, there was need to provide transport which the managers did not have,” Charles told the Newsday newspaper.

Read the story: Former SPORTT execs deny minister's claims