Eustace – We inherited unpaid water, electricity and telephone bills

If any money is owed by the Office of the Leader of the Opposition, it’s the fault of the government.{{more}}

That is the view of Leader of the Opposition Arnhim Eustace, who claims that the Government of St. Vincent and the Grenadines owes that office, up to $28,000.

Eustace claims that the Office inherited unpaid water, electricity and telephone bills totaling that amount, when the Dr. Ralph Gonslaves administration decided to make quarterly subventions to the Office in 2010.

Previous to that, the bills from that office were sent to the Clerk of the House of Assembly, who forwarded them to the Ministry of Finance for payment.

“I wrote to the Director General of Finance, drawing it to his attention in 2010, early February: I said: ‘Listen, you all have not paid these bills, and if you are going to give me a subvention, and if I have to take these bills out of the subvention, we won’t be able to do much because that is twenty eight thousand dollars.’ There was no reply.”

“So between 2010 and 2011 what we did: we did some other things; for instance, we didn’t appoint the Research Officer right away, we tried to bring down the bills of the water, electricity and telephones, and we brought them down to December 2011 virtually to nothing.”

He said that the telephone line of the Office of the Leader of the Opposition has been disconnected since 2010, and that the Office uses the phone service of the New Democratic Party, which he said shouldn’t be.

“I had to let my secretary move from upstairs the Leader’s office, and go downstairs so she could take calls for me on the Party’s line and that is still the case right now.”

Eustace further claimed that when the Office received the most recent quarterly subvention, which is $37,500, it was $5000 short.

“That is how we happen to owe $1,100 on the telephone,” he added. “If we had gotten our full allocation, we would have owed nothing; so we decided that in the next quarter which starts in April, we will clear the telephone.”

The President of the NDP says he does not know how the list from LIME which gave the breakdown of the sum which the telecommunications company claims it is owed by the government was circulated on social media.

The circulated list did not show the amount owed by the Office of the Leader of the Opposition.(JJ)