And, finally tonight, we're still following up on that practice we uncovered last week, which is called "structuring" - breaking down payments from the Treasury in amounts below $10,000 so that they can escape the scrutiny of the Ministry of Finance.
We saw it used 494 times over 5 years with Minister of State for Defence Oscar Mira's sister, Jenny, when she received payments from the Ministry of Defence.
Last week, Minister of Infrastructure Development and Housing Julius Espat said there are practical uses for it in his ministry especially when they have to pay for emergency road works. He said that without that sub - 10,000 dollar discretionary payment, it would be impossible to run the government:
Jules Vasquez
"Are you, or does your ministry practice this sub $10,000 disbursement with its suppliers, maybe for good and clear reason to avoid the red tape of having to go to Finance?"
Julius Espat, Minister - MIDH
"Well, the regulation is clear. At certain levels, you have to report to certain people."
"What you try to do is you have layers. For example, a trucker needs something, he has to come in by certain departments and it has to be approved of the departments before it reaches the CEO."
"And so we try to be as equitable as we can with it. But it does happen, no doubt. If it doesn't happen, Jules, government shuts down, especially a ministry like us."
Jules Vasquez
"Do you all in MIDH have a pattern like this? It's called structuring or smurfing. They call it smurfing to, where you break down payments so that I could pay you 20,000. But in four payments, a $5,000 that can pass below the radar."
"Is it something that your ministry does?"
Julius Espat, Minister - MIDH
"We haven't seen the need to do it. If there's one or two, for whatever reason, I haven't seen it. But I'm telling you that all small payments are mostly for truckers. The large majority is the hauling of material. And then another payment would be some of the rental of equipment that you would have to do."
We'll follow up on this story again this week.
