NO attempt has been made to recover the US$10,440 Caribbean Maritime University (CMU) spent to have former President Fritz Pinnock collect the international Socrates award in 2016, which has been dismissed in the British media as a “made-up honour”.

Deputy president of CMU Professor Ibrahim Ajaguna told the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) Tuesday that at the time when Pinnock received the award it was accepted by the university as an institutional award, not a personal achievement for Pinnock, who is now before the courts on charges of breaches of the Corruption Prevention Act, conspiracy to defraud, misconduct in a public office at common law, and breaches of the Proceeds of Crime Act.

“There has been no attempt to recover any money because when the award was received we all accepted it in glory, by the university as well as our stakeholders across the Caribbean, so we didn’t see it as a personal award at that time,” Ajaguna said.

An International Business Times report stated that the Socrates award is given to a “personality who has had a global influence on economic and social progress”.

Ajaguna pointed out that just over US$4,000 of the total sum went towards Pinnock’s attendance at a leadership conference leading up to the presentation of the award. According to the university, Hyacinth Bennett, the then board chair, was aware of the award and had given her blessings for the related expenditure.

“The necessary research has been done regarding the legitimacy of the award. While the information found does not indicate that the company that issued the award is illegal, it shows that the company utilised its approach to earn income,” the CMU had said in its response to a report by the auditor general.

However, the auditor general said the award appeared to be of a personal nature and that the university’s board had not granted approval for CMU to absorb the cost of Pinnock’s participation at the award ceremony in Oxford, England. The auditors also noted the articles in the overseas press suggesting that there is controversy surrounding the award which was bestowed on Pinnock.

In an update, acting permanent secretary in the education ministry Dr Grace McLean said the ministry’s probe into the company that issued the award — Europe Business Assembly — is now complete and a comprehensive report has been sent to the new CMU board chair to decide whether Pinnock should pay back the US$10,440.

Dr McLean said, based on the findings, Europe Business Assembly is legitimate but its approach for the awards was unethical.

“The approach that the company uses is really for fund-raising, so the company organises conferences on a yearly basis; they contact prominent or popular persons in different countries who they believe may be worthy of the award… that was what happened in this case. Based on the publications that we saw and the review from the international scene, the company is not illegal but the approach that is used in providing these awards could be somewhat considered to be unethical,” she outlined.

Member of Parliament for Manchester Central Peter Bunting said the recipients of this award were either gullible or narcissistic.

“It’s really disappointing that our former university president and the council chairman would have been duped by these scammers, essentially,” he said.

Chairman Mark Golding also noted that CMU was unable to carry through on the completion of a building which remained uncompleted after two years, but had deemed it fit to spend scarce resources on an award that was of no value. He was referencing the payment of US$989,485 for sandwich panels, high beams, iron and other assembly materials, in addition to $143.9 million in local costs, inclusive of demurrage charges totalling $33 million, on building construction which is still at foundation stage after two years.

The auditor general’s report also called attention to the reimbursement of over US$12,697 to the former president for fixed assets which were reportedly purchased on behalf of the university. However, the auditor general said there was no record of the items being included in CMU’s fixed assets register nor were they presented for inspection.

Furthermore, the audit team said the CMU reimbursed Pinnock for items costing US$2,380.44 between June 2016 and June 2018, and a review of the supporting documents indicated that these payments were for tokens (gifts) to officials at various meetings and workshops.

“However, we were unable to determine the recipient of the tokens and the authority for granting gifts, as CMU did not have a policy to guide the issue of gifts,” the report said.

The committee has indicated that it will be inviting former permanent secretary in the education ministry Dean-Roy Bernard to give an account of the expenditures in the report, which he oversaw.

Following the publishing of the auditor general’s report in January and a decision to reassign him from the education ministry to the finance ministry, Bernard was quoted in a Sunday Gleaner report as categorically refuting any assertion that he bypassed the due diligence process in the discharge of his duties. He was granted leave by the Supreme Court in October to resume permanent secretary duties at the ministry. However Dr McLean, former chief education officer, is still acting in the post.