And from frustration with the justice system to the frustration many in the public feel with the Briceno administration right now. As we have shown almost nightly, a cluster of politically connected companies has been supplying rations to the BDF since 2020 and profiting handsomely from what our analysis shows are overpriced products.
Today the press asked Minister of Immigration Kareem Musa what he feels about the recent negative exposure and the patronage patterns it exposes:
Jomarie Lanza, Reporter
"Do you frown on the revealed familial and political ties between some of your Cabinet colleagues and these suppliers?"
Kareem Musa, Minister of Immigration & Labour
"Um, I think you're referring to the case of the Miras."
Jomarie Lanza
"There's the case of the Miras, there's a Cabinet Secretary now, the Prime Minister's brother. We could go on and on."
Kareem Musa
"Yeah. So again, that is something to be determined by the Auditor General's findings. But I guess we can speak on the Mira issue. But those are companies that were incorporated long before the Miras, or sorry, the Minister actually became the Minister of Home Affairs, and they were supplying to the government, albeit not at that very large scale. So those are established companies."
Jomarie Lanza
"MP Farms was registered under the PUP administration?"
Kareem Musa
"I'm not sure, but from what I understand, I think it had a name, Mira Produce, I don't know what it is good for, but the same individuals changed the name of the company to MP Farms, but it was something before, I don't know though."
Jomarie Lanza
"But do you support that type of business?"
Kareem Musa
"I support transparency, Paul, and where we go from here is extremely important and so putting out the bids. So if the Miras are offering the same vegetables at a lower cost than say Save U or Brodies or whichever other vegetable supplier, then we should go to the Miras. But at the end of the day it should be published for transparency purposes."
Jomarie Lanza
"When you were at Home Affairs, was the sub-10K payment practice being used and under what circumstances?"
Kareem Musa
"I think it happens in every single ministry, Jomarie, but I certainly don't think it was on any large scale. It would be for individual cases, so again that is something you'd have to ask the Minister of Home Affairs."
For clarity, MP Farms and Mira's Fruits and Veggies were competitive in some foodstuffs but not as competitive in others. Most notably, the volume of business the Government did with MP Farms after Oscar Mira became Minister of Defence increased by 311% year-to-year.
