By Fareeza Haniff

FORMER President, Bharrat Jagdeo has admitted to Cabinet’s involvement in the National Insurance Scheme’s (NIS) investment in the Berbice Bridge Company, but was quick to state that Cabinet never discussed where the scheme should invest its money.Jagdeo was at the time responding to questions at a press conference on Wednesday, where he debunked the findings of a forensic audit into NIS, where it was revealed that Cabinet had a significant input and made key investment decisions, instead of the NIS Board.

“We dealt with NIS several times, but never about where NIS should invest their money. The only time that came up was when they made some investments in the bridge,” the Opposition Leader said.

He further explained that Cabinet also discussed the future of NIS.

“As far as I recollect, that the Cabinet did not deal with investments of NIS resources. The Cabinet made no decision about where NIS resources were invested. That was done rightfully so at the level of the Board. We dealt with the NIS several times, we discussed, but from more an actuarial perspectives to look at the future of NIS, its sustainability and we discussed it several times after the CLICO issue to ensure the resources of NIS were not lost.”

But according to the recent findings of the audit, “Cabinet had significant input over the Board and made certain decisions, which the directors accepted without any discussions, analysis and due diligence to determine the merits of the decisions.”

The NIS Board was chaired at that time by former Head of the Presidential Secretariat, Dr Roger Luncheon.