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Success has many fathers; but corruption, to paraphrase, is a bastard.
Fortunately, Mr Live Wire has a paternity kit. So let’s have a look at the now defunct LifeSport programme, which has been held in a headlock by the media for the past two months.
(Courtesy SPORTT Company)
LifeSport, of course, is the brainchild of former Sport Minister and swim coach Anil Roberts who quit his Government post on Thursday after falling into the deep end. Hopefully, the DPP will ensure that Roberts’ obligations to his problem child do not end there.
LifeSport’s godparents were permanent secretary Ashwin Creed, director Ruth Marchan and Ministry of Sport advisor Caryl Kellar.
Creed spent much of the last three months in hiding after he allegedly received death threats linked to his role with the controversial programme. Athletes all over the country would probably hope that he remains out of sight.
For while sporting bodies and elite athletes struggle for financial assistance, the Ministry of Sport funnelled a still unknown amount of taxpayers’ money to unidentified athletes at Creed’s Rebirth track club.
Let’s just say that, since Creed and Roberts teamed up, transparency is about as welcomed at the Sport Ministry as Chandresh Sharma is at Balisier House.
Marchan was often a go-between between the Ministry of Sport and LifeSport coordinators—several of whom, according to the Central Audit Committee, were said to have criminal links. She told the coordinators, sometimes in dollars and cents, what her superiors required of them.
Now, Marchan is in hiding after her bodyguard Curtis “Tallman” Gibson was gunned down two months ago; and she sensationally alleged that former Boxing Board advisor Boxu Potts and fellow director David Bobb are wishing harm to befall her.
Considering that Marchan was named for allegedly pocketing kickbacks from Potts for a Sport Ministry-sponsored boxing event in 2011, she does not quite live up to her own billing as the epitome of integrity and justice. But any port for a storm.
(Courtesy News.Gov.TT)
And the mysterious Kellar? By all accounts, he fixed problems for the Minister and has some pretty tough dudes on his “My Lime” list. You are supposedly better off running into an army of black cats than crossing his path.
On ground level, the Director of the LifeSport was responsible for keeping the wheels turning. In two years, the bum in this seat has changed four times. Forbes Persaud, the former Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board (TTCB) CEO, ran the first leg. He’d rather not talk about it, though.
Ex-deputy police commissioner Winston Cooper succeeded Persaud. Unsurprisingly for a former top local lawman, he didn’t detect or report anything wrong.
Henry Charles was third and he told the Trinidad Guardian that he left due to inconsistencies he noticed: “I was there for a year, and I am in no way surprised by what I am seeing now.”
It sure took Charles a long time to realise he was working in a cesspit.
Cornelius Price replaced Charles this February and was in charge when the bottom of the bucket fell out. Price and Charles were both fingered by the Audit for their alleged fervour in ensuring that suspect catering invoices were paid.
And then there was Adolphus Daniell who managed to resuscitate LifeSport after the Ministry of Finance temporarily halted funding for the programme in 2013. Daniell said he did not charge LifeSport for his assistance; and promptly pocketed $34 million for an unfulfilled education contract, which proves he is indeed a smart man.
If Warner is the answer, Mr Live Wire does not want to hear the question.
Iswhar Muttoo, COP councillor for St Augustine South/Piarco/St Helena, is the deputy chairman of the LifeSport Implementation Committee but could not explain how Daniell got his plum contract. That was more than his colleagues were willing to say.
The Sunday Express rang up the men and women on the SPORTT Company board who were supposed to provide oversight to the programme and they were all much too shy to speak. It was in stark contrast to their apparent behaviour over their past two years when, by their negligence, they might as well have lifted their collective skirts whenever someone whispered “LifeSport.”
The SPORTT Company board is chaired by Sebastien Paddington, a former national swimmer who was once coached by Roberts, and also includes: Reynold Bala, Norris Blanc, Nisa Dass, Dr. Anyl Gopeesingh, Sabrenah Khayyam, Matthew Quamina, Annan Ramnanansingh, Kent Samlal, Harnarine Seeram Singh and Milton Siboo.
Paddington declined comment on Daniell’s TT$34 million pay-out until he could speak to the company’s lawyers.
Paddy, you haven’t thoroughly discussed that little TT$34 million business yet? Been busy, eh? Do get back to us on that, okay?
John Mollenthiel, who quit as SPORTT Company CEO just last month in-between the media revelations, was trying to keep his head down too.
(Courtesy SPORTT)
“I really don’t want to say too much on (LifeSport) because my fear is my name gets out there,” Mollenthiel told the Trinidad Newsday. “And I’m really not keen to have my name thrown about and caught up in too much bacchanal.”
In fact, the Audit noted that Daniell’s controversial TT$34 million payment followed: “recommendation from (Ashwin Creed) the Permanent Secretary, MOS to (John Mollenthiel) the CEO SporTT, the Board of SporTT at a meeting held on March 8, 2013 ratified the decision made on December 6, 2012 to award the contract…”
Tell Mr Mollenthiel that bacchanal reach.
There are numerous other peripheral figures whose names should be in the DPP’s in-box.
Like Susanna Haddad, the first female president of the Bodybuilding and Fitness Federation, and her S and P Sport Coordinators company that, like Marchan, played a curious role between the Ministry and the coordinators.
Haddad, whose brother Anthony Haddad did get on to the Audit report, relieved grassroot coordinators of significant sums of money through her heavy invoices for equipment and miscellaneous items. And, based on the invoices Mr Live Wire has seen, Haddad might have delivered more sporting equipment around Trinidad and Tobago than FIFA and the International Cricket Council (ICC) combined.
It is more than passing strange that the Central Audit Committee struggled to find proof of the billed equipment.
Thus far, the fingers have pointed towards dodgy amounts paid out to ground floor operators. For instance, Trinidad Newsday journalist Walter Alibey, according to the audit, received a contract valued at TT$832,703.50 (VAT inclusive), which appeared to have been awarded without tender.
However, the Audit said Alibey only submitted invoices for TT$385,356, which was less than half the value of the contract.
Did Alibey not want the other TT$447,347.50 for his completed work? Where did that money disappear to?
Throw a couple hundred Alibeys together and it is possible that almost half the LifeSport largesse never made it to the eat-a-food opportunists or “criminal underworld.” Or, at least, not the people commonly considered as criminals.
The whereabouts of those figures, which left the SPORTT Company but never made it to the contractors, will tell us if the Sport Minister was as removed from the fiasco as he claims.
So please don’t switch off your phone, Mrs Haddad.
Thus far, only one person related to Life Sport was grilled by the police. Rajaee Ali, the Jamaat-al-Muslimeen member from Carapo and a former murder accused, spoke to lawmen twice already and spent two nights in a cell based on the anti-gang legislation.
The anti-gang legislation allows the police to detain, without a warrant, anyone it reasonably suspects to have committed an offence for a period not exceeding 72 hours.
One such offence, which carries a 20-year prison term, is if a person “knowingly commits, assists, aids or abets in the commission of an activity at the direction of, or in concert with, or for the benefit of, the gang, or conceals or assists in the concealment of the same.” The legislation further describes as a gang leader as “a person who knowingly initiates, organises, plans, finances, directs, manages or supervises any gang-related activity.”
Someone suspected of financing, aiding or concealing gang-related activity can be held for three days without a warrant? And, in three years, the police has never suspected anyone of this outside of East Dry River, Laventille or Carapo?
Curious indeed.
Well, LifeSport does not appear to be short of gangs or criminal activity. Between the allegations of fraud, threats of violence, at least one recorded murder and suggestions of criminal behaviour from gangs in Carapo, Bazilon Street, the Sport Ministry and the SPORTT Company, there appears to be an unholy marriage of convenience between white and blue collar criminals.
And it is the white collar criminals who are running this enterprise.
The list of persons involved with LifeSport at an administrative level includes: Anil Roberts, Ashwin Creed, Ruth Marchan, Caryl Keller, Forbes Persaud, Winston Cooper, Henry Charles, Cornelius Price, Adolphus Daniell, Iswhar Muttoo, Sebastien Paddington, Reynold Bala, Norris Blanc, Nisa Dass, Dr Anyl Gopeesingh, Sabrenah Khayyam, Matthew Quamina, Annan Ramnanansingh, Kent Samlal, Harnarine Seeram Singh, Milton Siboo and John Mollenthiel.
The board members still there are Dr Anyl Goopeesingh (far left), Matthew Quamina (third from left), Kent Samlal (fourth from left), Nisa Dass (third from right), Caryl Kellar (second from right) and Milton Siboo (far right).
(Courtesy Trinidad Guardian)
If lawmen use the right legislation, they won’t even need a warrant to enjoy their company for a few nights. Suddenly, the anti-gang bill would be denounced for the oppressive law that it is.
For now, it seems that dozens of people were involved in a criminal enterprise which defrauded taxpayers of millions. But only Rajaee Ali had what calypsonian Shadow described as “a bandit face.”
Editor’s Note: Wired868 inserted as hyperlinks the various news reports referenced in this story and would like to commend the respective reporters and news houses for their dogged work.
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I like how polished and upstanding all of these bandits look. Not one of them in ah wifebeaters and three quarter pants. So no lock down and harassment for them.
All I hear is Tom Cruise saying “Show me the MONEY!!!” But I don’t think we may ever see it again.
I think that diversion is what should really attract our attention Alvin. More than even Rajaee Ali and Walter Alibey.
We wait for the result of that ‘speedy’ investigation for the names to be revealed when charged – or will there be any charges proffered! The very manner in which this was done sickens the soul. The effrontery shown to the intelligence of the public demands that from the PM, Minister and the whole Cabinet are culpable and should be prosecuted with appropriate reparation to the public’s purse. But I guess that and a parade of yellow donkeys we will never see. …….alvin
Au contraire monsieur, you won’t have to follow the next GE too closely to miss that parade.
It all started when “Invisible Man No. 1” recommended that Mr. Daniel’s company be given a sole selective contract for $34 million to teach literacy and numeracy to the alleged participants in the LifeSport programme. Who is “Invisible Man No. 1”? Then, “Invisible Men No. 2” agreed to award the contract without following the usual procurement procedures for a sole selective award, i.e. without first establishing that the services were necessary, no one else in T&T could provide the services and the price was fair and reasonable. Who are “Invisible Men No. 2”? Then “Invisible Man No. 3” drafted a perverse, one-sided or mad contract which caused SportTT to pay EBeam although the services were not provided. Who is Invisible Man No. 3? Then “Invisible Men No. 4” paid the $34 million in the full knowledge that the services were not provided. Who are “Invisible Men No. 4”?
Did someone not see the no smoking sign on wonder woman’s plane and it’s why the invisible men couldn’t get away? is it being de-fumigated at a hangar in Macoya?
Well it would appear that there was a conspiracy to defraud the taxpayers of a considerable sum of money through various channels. I must come to the conclusion that while the monies were diverted through various channels a large portion of each was redirected to a main body. This means that there were a number of persons involved in the diversion. There certainly was knowledge aforethought from Captain, the Minister, to crook for this to be properly set up as appears to be shown through the audit. …….alvin
And what role did the Ministry of Finance play in the whole affair?
It is shocking that these goodly gentlemen could execute a sole selective contract for services of questionable efficacy, without competitive tendering, and without a value for money audit, and pay for $34 million for services that were not provided, and play dumb thereafter when asked why they committed such an unpardonable “error”. On what basis did they select Mr. Daniel to be the beneficiary of such largesse? Who is the madman (or worse) who drafted that contract? Why did they pay when they knew that the services were not provided? The whole thing stinks. It has all the hallmarks of a conspiracy.
yeah, one that won’t be able to be solved as easily as Mel Gibson giving Julia Roberts a greeting card.
I hear Mr Sebastian Paddington of SPORTT has a luxurious YACHT. Good talk.
Thanks for the info bud! I don’t have 34 million to even lease a yacht but I’ll try to handle a scene with one of dem fellas down carenage and turn up to the interview in a pirogue next time. Ah ha’ to try something in these times yes! It look like people tryin aall kinda thing and getting through, so who is me?
real talk ,its only the ghettoe man that they want to trap with the anti-gang legislation but it seemed that the they have fallen in their own snare,LOLOLOL
make sure you deal with them whenever you catch them in a fete match for me please, please, please, please, pleeeeease!!
Coming to think about it, is there anti government legislation??
The resumes of some of these faces and names will show them to be recurring decimals in state enterprise procurement folly.
0.34343434343434343434343434343434343434343434343434…………
swimming while talking whale
Thanks Sheila Rampersad… And for the investigative reporters: just keep swimming, just keep swimming… (Finding Nemo)
No need for the disclaimer, Colin Benjamin. Lasana Liburd, great piece.
What can one say but praise the LORD 4 exposing a diabolical plan.
PIcture Anil in a grey Nehru neck suit biting his little finger saying that he is going to take over the world for 34 meellion dollars ransome! And Daniell is his No.2.
No homo, but loving Anil’s suit in this story pic ha..
Maybe missing a top hat with a corbeau feather to go with the sobriquet The Mighty Robber–ts!
Sad
For once I would like to see these corrupt perpetrators get what is coming to them. This is a younger and newer breed of corrupt politicians. Trinis need to stand up and demand that they be prosecuted!
I wish every last one of these criminals get what should be coming to them!!
yeah a colon cleanse!
LifeSport was already dead. So Anil’s departure doesn’t change much. He is running away from the scene of a crime. I hope the digging does continue.
According to Colin Benjamin a few posts up, he cannot be running away from himself!
@ Lasana- Roberts’ departure deals with one element of LifeSport. The digging will continue but we also have enough in the public domain to chew on.
Well hear nah…this take win!
“If Warner is the answer, Mr Live Wire does not want to hear the question.”
Lasana Liburd, tell them to go join Rebirt. smh
I had such great expectations of a sportsman and coach handling this effort. There was /is little that he does not know of sport generally, he was warned about some of his advisors immediately upon taking office, fact, he persisted, the result being …..
How can such sum be played with and no one knowing about it all ? Checking before payment is fundamental, failure so to do should warrant jail time, it a no brainer.
Every one now knows who did what but at the time they did not, how amusing, this COMEDY has only one stage and that is JAIL for every one involved.
But u know what, NOTHING but NOTHING will come of all this, That is not a hope or wish that is a PREACH.
Check the other Ministries, ha, ha, ha !
And if this continues Emlyn Charles David, only children from homes with financial clout will be able to represent Trinidad and Tobago. Because it is only those whose parents can afford to send their children tour can go.
Consider how many great past athletes would have been left behind. Dwight Yorke might have never gotten off the island.
yeah he’d be still be stuck here with the skipper, professor, mr. howell, his wife, ginger and Marianne kicking coconuts!
Nice work.
Arlene, it took me about half hour reading, linking and digesting this piece….but I love the plaque in the first foto “GOLD RUSH”….is true
Imagine a 12 year old girl who represented table tennis from Tobago was the junior female sport personality of the year 2013. She together with Dylan Carter male sport personality was on the national media. This little girl together with other members of the under 15 and under 18 table tennis team coaches and chaperone had to pay their own expences to represent the country in a caribbean tournament in cuba in April. People got money for not even entering a sport field or complex. I think we have to help the youths at an early stage. The under 11 and under 13 suppose to go to Puerto Rico in December for the Caribbean tournament just a little funding from life sport could help the children and their parents. Hmmmmmmm.
And yuh know if she stop play, post nude pics to some fella named Justin, Mother busts her ass on social media, people will say that they don’t know what this country’s coming to. Seems the only other way to be taken seriously as a young girl in this country is to go on a hunger strike or cuss up the Prime Mins on Youtube! Look at the women footballers! would anyone like their girl children to get low self esteem from playing sports when other alternative forms of exercise they see usually involve twerking on their heads?
It is sad, for me, to see two of the names implicated in this ever-expanding bacchanal. One of them literally exchanged a bacchanal job for what turned out to be an even worse one. The other, who has high political linkages himself, is someone I went to school with many moons ago. Thankfully my links to these people end there, lest I too get caught in the riptide that LifeSport has become. What a mess Mr Two Pull (And a Bull) has wrought upon us!
And that’s the thing. $5.5 million supposedly paid to him.
Bet less than half of that reached him.
Thanks Faine. And kudos to Asha Asha Javeed and the others who kept digging.
I think Anil Roberts hopes his resignation calls off the search. That must not happen.
Everyone hightailing it for the hills,
Shame shame shame!!!! $34 Million, to do nothing????…. What the hell we really paying taxes for ???? I better file for tax yes……..
Well done.
I have a headache.
Interesting
On the website, it still says Mollenthiel. But Adrian Raymond is the present CEO.
Haven’t seen that stated anywhere before but all the rats trying to jump ship now.
Mr Daniell, I’d like you to answer Liz Williams’ question.
And to note that, as a taxpayer, I am standing by to forward my own and my two dependents’ account numbers in case you decide to go the direct route instead of trying to work through them setta tief in the Ministry.
A lot of people have been bullied and intimidated into silence. And through that intimidation, the real criminal masterminds hope to escape.
Mollenthiel resigned as CEO? When did that happen?
Mr Daniell, I think it is completely unreasonable for anybody to want you to give the money back to them thieves in the Ministry. As a taxpayer, I recommend that you explore the option of giving it back directly to taxpayers.
I can supply my account number and the account number of the other two taxpayers in my household on request.
Haha. I concur!
Ibid!
this procurement bacchanal starting to look like extortion…a gang crime, identified as illegal in the anti-gang act…
Ah ain’t even read the whole story and i blasted piss off. As a social worker i fighting hard to make linkages between health ,housing ,welfare and education for my clients mainly school children and their families and getting a set of run around and prayers. And them thieving my hard earn money for them and they friends from aside.
What I would like to see is us walking away from an event when these people turn up and are acknowledged, or even just turn up publicly.
Jeez
Wonder how they’re planning to cover this one up. But they will as they’ve had plenty of practice and we, the people will continue to allow them to get away with their BS. Big STEUPS!!
Excellent!
This term Special Advisor seems to be connected with missing monies
Humm when r tax payers getting back their monies?