Attorney General Says Kitchen Logs Key to Defense Procurement Probe

Did taxpayers get what they paid for in the Ministry of Defense procurement scandal? That is one of the key questions now before the Office of the Auditor General, as it continues its investigation into the so-called Mira Family Millions controversy. Auditor General Maria Rodriguez says her team is not only looking at invoices and purchase orders, they are checking the paper trail against what actually happened on the ground. That includes reviewing kitchen logs to see whether the supplies the ministry says it bought match what was recorded and used during that period. Rodriguez says that is one way auditors determine whether public funds delivered real value for money.

 

Maria Rodriquez, Auditor General

“As far as I am concerned the rations were to be used for the BDF. So, where will the rations be used, the kitchen. The kitchen has to have a log of what you will cook. Now, the difficulty.”

 

Sabreena Daly

“Is if they logged it.”

 

Maria Rodriquez
“That is right. But, to clarify, if you did not log it more so you are telling me that you are not accountable of what you bought. So, it is in your best interest as a ministry to document and record, because the auditors will not be able to confirm that what you purchased is what you use.”

 

Sabreena Daly

“How acceptable is the excuse that we simply did not log, we are not good at doing these things?”

 

Maria Rodriquez

“That is not acceptable. WE record it, we put it in the report as a reportable matter that it is not acceptable. And there is other ways of doing things, we do observations. For example, in a kitchen, any kitchen, for the hospitals, any entity that cooks for the residents, we will do observations. We will sit and see what the chef is cooking for that day and guess what, two weeks after we go back to check what is logged in the book. And if what we saw does not match what you have in the book then we know something is wrong.”

 

Paul Lopez

“So you all are spending time in the kitchen at the BDF these days?”

 

Maria Rodriquez

“Not yes, but it is coming.”

 

Was Conflict of Interest Ignored in Defense Ministry Procurement Deal?

 

The Auditor General’s investigation into the Ministry of Defense procurement scandal is now looking beyond the contract itself and into whether possible conflicts of interest were ignored along the way. Maria Rodriguez says the issue should not stop with the company that submitted the bid. She argues that responsibility rests with the ministry’s CEO and the Ministry of Finance, because every procurement goes through layers of approval. And at each stage, she says, someone should have asked the obvious questions: Who is connected to whom, and were family ties allowed to influence the process?

 

Maria Rodriquez, Auditor General

“I cannot say that conflict of interest occurred. Only a court system can do that. I can say alleged conflict of interest occurred. Just to clarify. However the evidence will prove whether there was alleged conflict of interest or not and it is also important to clarify who had the responsibility to ensure there is no conflict of interest, the accounting officer, the Chief Executive Officer. So regardless of if a minister says my brother, or my sister or my, it is the Chief Executive Officer who should have said, minister there might be a possible conflict of interest here. So if that did not occur then that risk was not dealt with appropriately by the minister. And, let me add, other entities should also have come into the picture. You have the ministry of finance who gives no objections to these contracts. You should have said wait, so and so wait, have you checked on this? You have the contractor general, these contracts are in the names of, have you checked on this? So, you have third parties who should have gotten involved in at least identifying this risk.”

 

The Auditor General notes that Belize’s laws do not presently provide for a formal conflict of interest declaration.

 

Attention readers: This online newscast is a direct transcript of our evening television broadcast. When speakers use Kriol, we have carefully rendered their words using a standard spelling system.

 

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