NASSAU, BAHAMAS — Attorney General Ryan Pinder defended the confidential settlement his office made with Financial Secretary Simon Wilson, saying confidentiality clauses are common in such agreements.
His comment came after Eyewitness News revealed that although the government settled the case Wilson brought under the Minnis administration, a confidentiality clause prevents the public from knowing how much taxpayer funds were awarded to him.
Critics believe such clauses have been abused in agreements over the years and that the public should be able to scrutinize awards.
“Confidentiality clauses in settlement agreements are commonplace,” Pinder told reporters yesterday.
“They’re commonplace (in) private to private settlements, they (are) commonplace (in) government to private sector and public sector settlements. So they’re not out of the ordinary and there is a lot of reasons for having them.
“Needless to say, with respect to the settlement with Mr Simon Wilson, we retained the services of a former senior public servant who would have gone through all of the facts and the allegations and the documents and the files on the matter, provided his professional, independent advice from a senior public service point of view and that was used with respect to constructing the settlement agreement with Mr Simon Wilson.”
Pinder said confidentiality clauses are not inconsistent with the Freedom of Information Act.
“Legal matters are legal matters and legal matters in certain instances would be exempt from the Freedom of Information Act,” he said.
Some courts in other jurisdictions have found confidentiality clauses inconsistent with FOIA. Matt Aubry, head of the Organisation for Responsible Governance, said yesterday that the local information commissioner may have to determine if this is the case in The Bahamas.
National Security Minister Wayne Munroe criticized the government’s frequent use of confidentiality clauses prior to his election as a parliamentarian.
“The reason (to disclose settlement agreements),” Munroe said in 2018, “is it permits you scrutiny to see if there has been even-handed application of a policy. It also prevents politicians talking tough in public about somebody, then settling quietly behind the scenes.
“Disclosure will also tend to expose if a government or a politician is using public funds improperly either to benefit persons of a particular class, to give money to your boys or to discriminate against other persons and to make other people go through a lot of challenges.”
“In a settlement agreement, a confidentiality clause is usually to advance a commercial interest. If the company is a private company or a defendant is a private person, that’s simple. But when the defendant is the state or the government, you have accountability and transparency issues.”
Wilson sued the government after the Minnis administration forced him to take vacation leave to pave the way for Marlon Johnson to serve as financial secretary. Wilson sought damages, including aggravated and/or exemplary damages for libel.
