Opposition spokesman on mining, energy and telecommunications Clive Mullings yesterday called on the ruling People’s National Party (PNP) to respond immediately to what he said were “new and worrying revelations” that Dutch Oil trader Trafigura Beheer had not received the $31-million that the party said it returned just over a week ago.

Mullings said documented evidence needed to be publicly furnished in order to validate the statement by the PNP general-secretary and minister of information Donald Buchanan that the controversial money was returned.

Mullings, responding to a Nationwide News Network radio report yesterday, said that if the new revelations were true, they would “undoubtedly erase whatever moral credibility the Government currently holds” and force the administration “onto even shakier ground”.

Mullings demanded that Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller respond to questions posed by the Jamaica Labour Party on the issue in the nation’s best interest.

He also said that the recent decision by the Petroleum Corporation of Jamaica to put to tender the contract now held by Trafigura Beheer to lift and sell Nigerian oil for Jamaica, though welcomed, came too late. He said that the original contract had expired in December 2005, therefore the PCJ needed to explain to the public “the reasons behind the inordinate delay”.