CMU gag order to be lifted … PM says Gov’t intends to nullify non-disclosure agreements
Published:Sunday | March 1, 2020 | 12:00 AMLivern Barrett - Senior Staff Reporter
The Government is close to lifting the gag order imposed on members of the previous Caribbean Maritime University (CMU) Council through a non-disclosure agreement (NDA).
The NDAs first came to public attention through a Sunday Gleaner exposé published in January. The article, citing a whistle-blower, revealed that members of the council signed the NDAs – some reluctantly – after an eight-month period when there were no meetings of the oversight body.
An audit conducted by the Auditor General’s Department (AuGD) later found that over the same time frame, CMU executed contracts totalling just over $200 million, most of which required the approval of the council.
The NDAs are valid for five years from the date they were signed and bar council members from speaking publicly about information gleaned during their tenure.
Prime Minister Andrew Holness disclosed on Tuesday that following The Sunday Gleaner exposé, he requested a copy of the NDA from Dr Grace McLean, acting permanent secretary in the Ministry of Education.
Holness, who was speaking during an exclusive Jamaica House interview with The Sunday Gleaner, said the Government has made it “very clear that these agreements should not stand”.
“So, very shortly, I will communicate to the permanent secretary to say where the NDAs are still effective, they [former council members] should be released,” the prime minister stated.
“Because I believe that having these kinds of non-disclosure agreements runs counter to public institutions.”
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The announcement was embraced by one former council member.
The CMU council is mandated by law to manage the affairs of the scandal-scarred institution based on the outskirts of the capital city of Kingston. Members of the previous council have faced criticisms from sections of the society who believe they were asleep at the wheels.
“I think it would be good because some people may be prepared to talk and say what their concerns are,” the former council member told The Sunday Gleaner, on condition of anonymity.
“Some people see that [NDA] as a concern. If that concern is removed, they may be prepared to talk.”
The former council member indicated, though, that there was not a lot more that the public does not already know. “I don’t know what else is there to disclose. I mean, they can get down to some actual details in terms of how bad certain things were, but by and large everything is in the public space,” the person stated.
Hyacinth Bennett, the former chairman of the council, was described in The Sunday Gleaner exposé as a weak leader, who, along with other members, reportedly resisted repeated demands for greater accountability and failed to rein in senior CMU executives accused of breaching government guidelines.
“The chairman was a little more than comatose ... she was a waste of time. She did a terrible job. Sometimes there wasn’t even a proper agenda for meetings,” the whistle-blower said then.
According to the audit report by the AuGD, one of the entities engaged by the CMU during the eight-month period cited by the whistle-blower was ‘logistics company 1’, which The Sunday Gleaner has identified as Business Supply Source (BSS) based in the state of Florida, in the United States.
BSS was registered in February 2018, according to records in Florida, and selected by CMU on April 11 that same year as the preferred bidder to procure materials for a $701-million project being undertaken at its Palisadoes campus.
Two days later, the report said, BSS was paid US$621,132 – the full amount quoted in its bid document – despite the absence of a formal contract.
BSS was paid a further US$368,303 on June 6, 2018 to procure building materials that were not included in the original order.
Over the eight-month period, the CMU also inked a three-year, $15-million deal with former Jamaica Labour Party Member of Parliament Othneil Lawrence to serve as an adviser, and a two-year, US$155,000 or J$19.4-million contract with Gail Campbell Dunwell (a Jamaican residing in the US) to serve as a donor consultant. Within seven months, Campbell Dunwell was paid three-quarters of the total value of the contract, documents submitted to a committee of Parliament have revealed.
At the time, Campbell Dunwell was also engaged as a donor consultant by the education ministry.