The legal firm that represents Bahamas Electricity Corporation (BEC) Executive Chairman Leslie Miller has demanded that Bahamas Electrical Workers Union (BEWU) President Paul Maynard publically apologize over numerous allegations and insinuations he made in a recent letter addressed to Labour Minister Shane Gibson.
"Our client requires you to write a letter containing a full and complete withdrawal and apology in terms to be approved by us on our client's behalf and publish this apology in The Tribune, The Nassau Guardian and The Bahamas Journal," said McKinney, Turner & Co. in a letter addressed to Maynard dated January 19.
"[Our client requires you] to give us your written assurance and undertaking that you will not further publish this or any similar article concerning our client; to pay to our client a proper and suitable sum as damages for the injury to his reputation and for the embarrassment and distress caused to him and to indemnify our client in respect of the costs, which he will have [incurred] in this matter."
The firm said if Maynard failed to respond within seven days it would proceed with legal action in the Supreme Court. In a letter dated January 13, Maynard accused Miller of signing a contract recently with a foreign company without the board's approval to maintain the engines at BEC's Clifton Pier Power Station. The letter was copied to Prime Minister Perry Christie, Deputy Prime Minister Philip Brave Davis and Attorney General Allyson Maynard-Gibson.
The union president also made other allegations regarding Miller's alleged relationship with the company in question. He said that while Miller has railed against overtime at the corporation, this is to "smoke screen" the issues concerning the Denmark-based company. Miller has insisted that nothing could be further from truth.
Miller said BEC has no contract with the company. He said the corporation has used purchase orders, a commercial document generated to acquire goods or services, since the 1990s for the company to maintain and overhaul the engines at Clifton. He pledged to take "immediate legal action".
In response, Maynard said he welcomed Miller's decision to sue, noting that "the truth of the whole matter" will come out in court. In its letter, which Maynard said he received on Monday afternoon, McKinney, Turner & Co. reaffirmed that the allegations are "completely untrue and constitute a grave libel upon our client".
"Indeed your highly defamatory statements are very serious and damaging to our client," McKinney, Turner & Co. said.
When contacted yesterday, Maynard said he stands by what he said. He said his attorney is also involved.
Asked whether he is prepared to apologize, Maynard said, "No. That is not happening. And I want you to know that no one can be shut up. I will not be bullied," said Maynard, who was out of the country. "It is what it is, so do what you have to do."
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