A senior director at the Office of the Contractor General was reportedly threatened with death by an anonymous telephone caller yesterday. This after the watchdog claimed to have uncovered evidence of sham contractors being awarded millions of dollars from the National Housing Trust.

The OCG said in a statement today that it immediately reported the matter to police, while the senior director has met with officers from the Protective Services Division of the Jamaica Constabulary Force.

The senior director has headed an audit of five contractors involved in five irregular contractor re-registration applications, believed to be a criminal conspiracy involving the award of Government contracts by the NHT. All five applications were submitted to the National Contracts Commission between September and October of last year by the managing director of one of the contractor applicants.

The team led by the senior director reportedly taped interviews with representatives of all five contractors and four NHT employees who are of interest to the OCG enquiry, during the past two weeks.

The five contractors have, during the past four years, been awarded NHT contracts worth a total of at least $87 million.

The OCG said that the interviews provided the following evidence:

- Four of the contractors are sham contractors. One of the four is a full-time social studies school teacher at a prominent St Andrew High School, while another is an information technology specialist.

- The OCG presumes that the fifth contractor uses the other four contractors to channel NHT contract awards. The contracts are awarded to the four but performed by the fifth.

- Joint bank accounts in the name of the fifth contractor are maintained with at least two of the sham contractors at NCB’s Knutsford Boulevard, New Kingston Branch, which the OCG presumes, facilitate Government contract payments in the names of the sham contractors.

- At least two of the sham contractors allege that they were approached by the fifth to act as sham contractors. The managing director of the fifth contractor is a church brother of one of the sham contractors and a neighbour of one of the other sham contractors. One of the sham contractors alleged that discussions with the managing director of the fifth contractor, took place at the Bethel Baptist Church in Half-Way-Tree where they both worship.

- A full-time NHT project manager, who plays a significant role in recommending which contractors should receive small project works contracts, has been formally listed as a full time employee on the application documentation of the fifth contractor for the past four years.

- Two other full-time NHT employees of the NHT, employed in the trust's projects department, are also listed as full time employees of two of the sham contractors.

- The registration and re-registration application forms submitted to the NCC by the five contractors all contain falsified and fabricated information.

- A former employee of the OCG who was asked to resign by Contractor General Greg Christie in April 2008, on suspicion of corruption, appears to have colluded with the fifth contractor in preparing and/or processing the falsified applications.

- An OCG Director, who was previously an OCG Inspector, employed to the OCG for the past 18 years, verified as being true the false particulars of the four sham contractors when their applications were first submitted to the NCC in October 2005, January 2006 and June 2007. His contract was terminated on Monday after he admitted falsifying their contractor verification forms.

- The re-registration application for one of the sham contractors, lists as the sole “full time staff member” of the contractor’s “professional” staff, a Mr Rodney Chin. The supporting documentation includes identification and a copy of a Florida International University Degree in Civil Engineering identical to those contained in the OCG’s records relating to the principal of another registered Government contractor, Chin’s Construction Limited.

The OCG said that it has also passed onto police the details of all persons involved in its investigation.

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