Auditors query millions paid to BHC by Airport Authority

THE PAYMENT of US$504,296 (over TT$3 million) made by the Airports Authority (AA) to Birk Hillman Consultants (BHC) is being queried by auditors Ernst and Young.

The money was paid to BHC between September 7, 2001 and September 25, 2001 from the AA’s credit and US savings accounts with First Citizens Bank (FCB) Piarco branch. The bank was authorised to pay the sum by Joshey Mahabir, AA’s Finance and Administration Manager and Krishna Hayban, the AA’s Revenue and Treasury Accountant. The disclosure was made yesterday by Peter Cateau, the Ministry of Works and Transport client representative on the Piarco airport development project, who said he could not say what the payments were for. He said he could offer no logical explanation for the payment.

Cateau was giving evidence yesterday at the Commission of Inquiry into the airport project based on questions by the Commission’s lead attorney, Theodore Guerra, SC. President Maxwell Richards, on the advice of Cabinet, has issued a fresh warrant to the Commission to allow four of the five Commissioners to form the quorum to hear evidence. Commissioner Peter Bynoe’s illness forced the Commission to not hear evidence for four days pending the President’s warrant. Cateau said he was a signatory to the bank accounts of the project. He supplied bank statements and return cheques to the Commission covering the period January 2000 to April 2003. Cateau said in January this year auditors Ernst and Young conducted an internal audit at the AA.

Based on his discussions with the auditors he said he did a search and found several bank drafts, some of which were given to the Commission. He also produced a spreadsheet showing the payments by the AA for service by BHC. Seven of the payments were under query. Cateau read three letters signed by Mahabir and Hayban in which they requested FCB Piarco branch manager Norman Chang to pay monies to BHC. In the first instance a payment of US$300,000 from the AA’s current account was made on September 7, 2001. On September 14, 2001 US$82,296 was paid from the same account to BHC and on September 25, 2001 a payment of US$122,000 from AA’s US savings account was made to BHC. The three payments amounted to US$504,296 or over TT$3 million.

Asked by Guerra what the payments were for, Cateau said he didn’t know. He said as watchdog of the project he should have been aware of all payments to BHC. He said the payments did not come from the airport project account but the AA account and therefore he could offer no explanation as to why the AA paid BHC. He said he knew the AA had three contracts with BHC, but the payments did not seem to relate to any of them. However Cateau said the payments were made immediately before BHC signed substantial certificates of completion for several aspects of the project. Cateau said some of the certificates were premature. The certificates are to be issued when the particular area of work is fully completed. Cateau also said yesterday after reviewing documents BHC is being owed US$3.1 million and not US$5.1 million as NIPDEC’s records showed.

So far NIPDEC has approved US$18 million to BHC while Cateau has approved US$12.6 million for the Miami-based company. Commenting on the work done by one of the main contractors on the project, Northern Construction Limited (NCL), Cateau said the firm did $500 million worth of work over a 24-month period, but they appeared to lack top level management capability and their work appeared to be of a questionable quality in the areas of flooring, wall and ceilings. Cateau will return on Monday to be questioned by NIPDEC’s attorneys. The hearing will resume at 9.30 am today when former Housing Minister John Humphrey will be questioned by NIPDEC’s attorney.