The Chairman of the Junkanoo Corporation New Providence Limited (JCNP), Silbert Ferguson says no evidence has come to the surface in the alleged bribe claim made in a voice note that circulated social media following the parades.
Mr. Ferguson made his comments during a press conference the JCNP held to release the official Junkanoo results.
“The investigation is still going on, the JCNP took another step this week. We have assembled a special committee that will be working solely on this matter and then they will be working with the police; that’s as much as I can tell you at this point.
“But as you can see there is no evidence that has basically come forward and so we are stepping up from the inside now to work with the exterior as we move on with this issue,” Mr. Ferguson said.
When pressed on the issue, Mr. Ferguson said that when selecting judges, the committee relies on an individual’s integrity to guide them as judges.
“We’ve realized we’ve been hit with this. When we invite people to join us in our parades, we did not ask anybody to come and do unjust things to our Junkanoo groups.
“That is just something that’s alleged because there is no evidence. We have a lot of voice notes, we’ve had nobody come forth, even the person with the voice notes. So, at this time we are still awaiting.
“But the integrity of our judges, we’ve always preached that. We’ve always preached fairness here at the JCNP, because we want to have a level playing field for all of our groups and that is all we can do. We have to leave the integrity to that person who is coming to join us in partnership to judge our parades,” Mr. Ferguson said.
“Integrity is something you cannot train,” he said.
Mr. Ferguson, however, did say that if changes were to be made to the process of judging the Junkanoo parades, it will only done based on the findings of the committee currently investigating the claims of bribery.
“Once the committee returns with their findings, the committee will then present to the JCNP everything moving forward in terms of penalties and punishment for any person or groups that would be in this kind of activity moving forward,” Mr. Ferguson said.
Mr. Ferguson added that the JCNP has had several special called meetings since the allegations to deal with the issue.
Approximately 60 persons judged the two parades, the majority of them being women.
According to the JCNP it is believed they have narrowed down the list to ten.
