By RICARDO WELLS

Tribune Staff Reporter

rwells@tribunemedia.net

ENGLERSTON MP Glenys Hanna Martin yesterday suggested Tourism and Aviation Minister Dionisio D'Aguilar had only advanced their current spat over a 2017 Western Air rental agreement to divert attention away from the $20 million LPIA runway deal awarded to Bahamas Hot Mix, a company tied to Trade and Immigration Minister Brent Symonette's children.

The suggestion was made in a statement circulated by the Progressive Liberal Party yesterday, in response to comments made by Mr D'Aguilar outside Cabinet on Tuesday.

Branding the Free Town MP's inferences as a "shameless attack", Mrs Hanna Martin questioned why Mr D'Aguilar maintained the rental arrangement for two years, despite his opposition to it.

"He should really try to comprehend his own hypocrisy in this matter," she argued. "What we now know, however, is that this entire Western Air story is clearly a contrived distraction from the $20 million LPIA runway deal awarded under his watch by private tender to Bahamas Hot Mix, a company in which the children of his Cabinet colleague are significant shareholders.

"(Mr D'Aguilar) spoke at length about Western Air in his two hour budget contribution, but not one word about the LPIA runway deal. Things that make you go 'hmm,'" she added.

"And while we are talking about trailers, the minister must immediately address the deplorable living and working conditions of LPIA firemen in trailers at that aerodrome.

"They perform an essential service and their wellbeing really should have been prioritised by this talkative minister by now," Mrs Hanna Martin contended.

Mr D'Aguilar on Tuesday called the Western Air rental agreement "a very bad deal", and castigated Mrs Hanna Martin for her lack of business acumen.

Additionally, Mr D'Aguilar also addressed both the ongoing issue with firefighters at LPIA and Bahamas Hot Mix's award of a LPIA runway contract.

On the latter, Mr D'Aguilar insisted the company was the most qualified bidder to enter the tender process.

He told reporters: "You know, when we put this out to bid, only one Bahamian company responded. We invited more Bahamian companies to bid but only one responded… building a runway is a very technical piece of real estate, very technical piece of asphalt. You need the mechanisms in place to constantly check and recheck."

He continued: "In 2015, when the PLP wanted to extend the runway in Bimini, they used Bahamas Hot Mix. In 2015, when they wanted to fix the runway in Staniel Cay, they used Bahamas Hot Mix. In 2004 to 2006, the last time that major runway work was done at LPIA, the PLP used a foreign company, and they did such a substandard job that remedial works had to be done on that runway in 2009 in order for Virgin to bring their 747 here… so they are the premier company when it comes to runways. It's a very, very technical job and we hired a world-renowned consulting company to put together the proposal, put it out to bid. There were three international companies, one Bahamian, and the Bahamian company was by far the best."

Meanwhile on the firefighter issue, Mr D'Aguilar lamented the state of LPIA's fire services facility, going as far as to call it "a terrible situation."

He suggested that plans were being drafted to address the problem and begged workers to "bear with me a little bit loner."

"If I could make the decision to write the cheque I would have, but I'm dealing with other government agencies trying to get this problem dealt with and the Minister of Works has ensured me that we will be making progress to that as well," he said.

Further to that, when asked if there was a timeline on the construction of the new building, Mr D'Aguilar expounded: "I was actually warned by the former minister, Glenys Hanna-Martin, not to set timelines on these sort of things and so in that particular instance I decided to take her advice."

Mrs Hanna Martin served as transport and aviation minister in the former Christie administration.