The National Democratic Congress (NDC) representative for Carriacou and Petite Martinique says Government’s response to the “Cellphone gate” scandal is laughable.
Tevin Andrew, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) representative for Carriacou and Petite Martinique says Prime Minister Dr Keith Mitchell is trying to deflect from the issue.
Speaking to GBN via telephone from Carriacou, Andrew says he was baffled and shocked by the prime minister’s statements during post cabinet briefing on Tuesday.
He says the Prime Minister, who is also the Minister for Finance, did not explain why someone no longer in the government service was allowed to accumulate a bill that was being paid by government.
“The issue at hand is not that government ministers cellphone bills are high, or whether government ministers cellphone bills are being paid. That’s not the issue. The issue is that somebody, a political activist rather, cellphone bill was being paid by taxpayers and the person is not employed with the Government of Grenada.”
Andrew is challenging the PM to expose the bills incurred during the NDC’s term in government.
“I heard the Prime Minister said that he is going to expose the phone bills from 2008 to 2013. I say to Prime Minister Mitchell bring it on! And I don’t want him to just expose the phone bills from 2008 to 2013, I want him to make public the phone bills from 2013 to present, in particular, the phone bills of Mr. Sheldon Scott. What I can categorically state, factually state, is that the National Democratic Congress never paid any political activist cellphone bill and they were not employed with the Government of Grenada.”
Regarding Sheldon Scott’s admittance and promise to repay the exorbitant cell phone bill incurred, Andrew said that is laughable.
He is questioning who will ensure those monies are repaid.
“I heard of a situation the other day of someone who defrauded the NIS of thousands of dollars and he is now facing jail time and other people who might have defrauded other government institutions and so on faced jail time or faced the court. This is the first time am hearing of someone thieving from government or defrauding government thousands of dollars and they so bold face to write to the Ministry or Minister of Finance to say well yes I thief the money and I will pay you back and nothing, not FIU, no police investigation… no one is doing anything about that. I find this to be laughable.”
The leaked bills show charges from April to June 2019, amounting to over EC$70,000.
However the total bill for Scott, who left the position in 2016, and others no longer eligible, remains unknown.
