His disapproval of the act to amend the National Lotteries Act came
after Minister in the Ministry of Finance Christine Sahadeo asked
for a second reading of the Bill.
Sahadeo said that the NLCB now had more than 900 agents and that
the Board recognised that it needed to review its plans since its
present location could not meet its demands.
But during his contribution, Mark argued that the NLCB has not submitted
any financial audited accounts since 2000.
“This alone constitutes basis for rejecting the Bill.”
He called on Sahadeo several times during his discourse to tell
the Senate why the Board had failed to submit its audited financial
accounts.
Mark questioned the donations that were being given out by the Board
and said it is illegal to use to the excess money in its fund for
this purpose.
He asked why Intelisis was employed and paid US$75 million to find
out who received donations from the Board when the United National
Congress (UNC) was in power.
Mark recalled an incident where someone called “Voucher”
phoned him from Canada to ask him about the donation money.
Clearly fed-up by Mark’s rambling, Minister of Information
Dr. Lenny Saith asked: “Is there some basis for all this?”
Mark then asked once again how could the Board be granted additional
power “to utilise public funds to give to their friends”.
He advised the government to put the excess money in a fund to give
to poor people instead of giving to their friends.
“It is like taking from the poor to give to the rich,”
he commented.
He also broached the credibility of the company G-Tech and said
that the company was involved in some sort of peddling in nearly
every State in the USA in order to get its contract renewed.
G-Tech, an international company, introduced online gambling to
Trinidad and Tobago.
“I would like the Minister of Information Dr. Lenny Saith
to review very carefully this company called G-Tech.
“Its contract ends in 2006.
“I think it is time to cut our umbilical link and send them
packing.
“Let us look for local talent to engage in the same as G-Tech.”
Mark said that the UNC would not support the Bill since the government
refused to say why the Board needed additional power and said within
it were “rampant bias, abuse of authority, misuse of public
revenues and rampant conflict of interest”, that apart from
“skewed donations”.
According to him out of $12 million the government spends approximately
$4 million on marketing for the company and the remainder on public
relations, in vast contrast to when the UNC was in power where $3
to 4 million was spent on marketing and public relations for the
company.
Mark asked if it were true that chairman of NLCB Louis Lee Sing
hired a private security firm to investigate 99 of its employees
and why did its three financial accountants George Assam, Louis
Hernandez and Nicole Breedy leave the company during the last three
years.
He blasted the fact that NLCB was one the Ministry of Education’s
sponsors for the recent Sesame Street show and asked: “What
kind of message are we sending to our children?”
Mark begged Saith to call elections.
Mark said pointing and laughing: “Call elections; we ready.”
But Saith just laughed and mimicked him.
An unperturbed Mark said during the cross-talk that even though
the UNC was seemingly unprepared, come election time every single
member of the party would come together to win the next.
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