A NEW twist on the Christmas Carnival saga emerged yesterday – that the request for temporary approval to bring in equipment, apparatus, trailers and supplies for the event came from no less than the Progressive Liberal Party.

With that knowledge in mind, let’s flash back to some of the comments earlier in this debacle.

After a representative of the carnival said that Prime Minister Philip “Brave” Davis gave them permission to hold the event, Press Secretary Clint Watson dismissed that as “absolute nonsense”.

He went on to say: “The Prime Minister has never spoken about this issue, neither has he been involved in this issue.”

That would be the Prime Minister who is also the leader of the party that requested the approval.

Mr Watson went on to say: “The Prime Minister does not approve carnivals coming into the country.”

Again, it seems the PLP was involved in this process – so why did Mr Watson not avail himself of the opportunity to tell the public how closely involved with the organiser the ruling party was?

Meanwhile, the Health Minister, Dr Michael Darville, was busily saying approval had not been given to date. Then came the news the ministry had rejected the request.

It’s all a bit of a tangled web.

Now, it seems that both the PLP and the FNM have used the carnival as a party fundraiser, although this is not generally known to the public.

Asked yesterday about the letter showing the PLP’s request for approval, party leader Fred Mitchell promptly buried his head in the sand saying it would be “imprudent for me to go any further”.

Former FNM State Minister for Finance Zhivargo Laing said that political parties have partnered with carnival operators in the past.

He said: “The party in power tends to be involved and gets some financial benefit from it, that’s basically what I know. I thought (the financial benefit for a party) could be $200,000 plus, but I think it all depended on the economic circumstances…”

Mr Laing said there was nothing untoward about such a partnership – but if that is the case, why is it not common knowledge?

You have an instance where a foreign company is coming in to host an event that will financially benefit the party in power which is being asked to give its approval. On the face of it, that doesn’t look good. When you add it being kept quiet from the public, it looks even worse.

The party in government shouldn’t really be in the position of organising events to financially benefit itself that it has the final say on whether it goes ahead.

It is hard to imagine a firm line between the party as applicant and those aligned with the party in a position to approve or reject.

Think of what Mr Laing says – that it is the party in power that tends to be involved. Not a single party, not a particular entrepreneur, rather the carnival has become a Christmas pass the parcel for whoever is in charge.

And yet the most curious thing of all given this apparent connection is that the event didn’t get the go-ahead after all. We wonder how Dr Darville’s department’s ruling is being taken by those parts of his party that will now be left out of pocket.

Whatever deal linked the operators to the PLP, neither side will be making any money if the event doesn’t proceed.

In yesterday’s Insight, it was suggested that the government should publish all of the communications in relation to the approval or rejection of the carnival. The revelation that the party in power is involved in bringing the carnival to the country only furthers the need for that transparency.

What was promised in terms of payments to Customs, the price of work permits and so on? We hope too that this foreign company followed all the appropriate US regulations, especially if it has partnered with a political party on this and perhaps other occasions.

The Christmas Carnival situation was already a mess – without clearing everything up, it just might become a scandal.