…And Mayor Moya explains cheques to sister-in-law

And the mayor also dealt with the never-ending story about the infamous cheques that were disclosed last year by Councillor Mark King. The cheques were made out to Moya’s sister-in-law, Sharon Wade, for work done by the mayor’s brother’s company, SM Construction for the council including garbage collection. Today Moya revisited that issue.

Zenaida Moya
“That was a time when he was in the U.S. conducting some business and hence the reason why she was the one dealing with it.”

Keith Swift
“Did the Council approve this?”

Zenaida Moya
“This is something that from the onset the works and the goods—in this case it would be materials; all in materials, river run, chains, stones and so forth—these were materials that were needed and the same current Deputy Mayor, Anthony Michael, he was at the moment very in need of materials and if he wants to be honest he can speak on this matter. He at the time was very frustrated by the suppliers that we had. We would call the suppliers and they would not deliver, we’d call them again and they would not deliver. They would pretty much make us look bad. These are materials that were approved directly by the councilor in charge, in this case the Deputy Mayor Anthony Michael who’s responsible for Works. In the case of the picking up of or dealing with over seventy hotspots, again the councilor responsible or the manager in charge were also the ones who ensured that they called and they requested services.”

Marion Ali
“What’s the difference between the council giving your brother contracts to do work and your party accusing the P.U.P., when the P.U.P. was in government, of giving contracts to P.U.P. cronies?

Zenaida Moya
“Again, that’s something that, you know, I guess depends on how you look at it. In this case works were carried out. In no way can anybody say that works were being carried out, materials were not delivered and they were signed for every single time. In other instances when it comes to the other side, many times nothing was delivered.”

In its estimates of recurrent revenue and expenditure for 2007-2008, the City Council spent five point eight million, twenty percent more than it had projected, in garbage collection.