Premier Ewart Brown's claim that 482 visitors were lured to faith-based tourism events was scotched yesterday by United Bermuda Party MP Wayne Furbert — who says the real figure is probably about ten.

Mr. Furbert, a well-known member of the church community, has long maintained the true number of tourists enticed last year is no more than 100.

Having now seen Tourism Minister Dr. Brown's answers to Parliamentary questions on the controversial subject, Mr. Furbert believes the correct total only just crept into double figures if the performers themselves are discounted. However, the Department of Tourism insists no evidence of financial wrongdoing or misuse of taxpayers' cash has been found.

But an official statement added further confusion by suggesting former initiative boss Andre Curtis' company Harvest Investments Holdings ended up spending $70,000 of its own cash on faith-based tourism — as well as the $345,000 of taxpayers' money it received. It also showed salaries for Mr. Curtis and his administrative assistant totalled $154,500.

The Premier and Mr. Curtis deny the venture was used as a means of getting cash to Mr. Curtis as a thank-you gesture for running his constituency.

Mr. Furbert, one of Mr. Curtis' fiercest critics for the past 12 months, told The Royal Gazette: "I'm not going to go after Dr. Brown — I'm probably more concerned that Curtis has got away with not being accountable with the public funding.

"My number has gone from 100 tourists to less than 50. The people who have come have been the performers themselves. Bishop John Francis brought a large group with him. "If you don't count them, I'm probably down to ten people who came to see this faith-based programme."

Mr. Curtis' contract stipulated he was supposed to bring 2,200 tourists to the Island to justify receiving hundreds of thousands of taxpayers' dollars.

The 482 figure provided by the Premier included 170 who attended a Women of Vision event at Fairmont Southampton in February, even though it appears Mr. Curtis and faith-based tourism had next to nothing to do with that event.

It also included 48 at Weekend Fit For A King last September, although no records exist for that event and nobody has publicly provided any details about it at any stage despite numerous requests. Responding to questions from Opposition Leader Kim Swan on Friday, Dr. Brown revealed Harvest Investments was paid $345,250 to run faith-based tourism.

Mr. Curtis spent $208,089 organising 12 events throughout the year — with this newspaper reporting on Saturday that the remaining $137,161 was unaccounted for.

Late on Sunday, the Department of Tourism issued a press release explaining that faith-based tourism operating expenses also included "salaries for a director and an administrative assistant, related benefits, telephone, travel, meeting and other miscellaneous office expenses".

It said such expenses totalled $207,790 — meaning Harvest spent a total of $415,879 throughout the year, even though it only received $345,250 from Government.

It breaks down: $154,500 on wages/salaries; $23,175 on Government tax, insurance and pension; $12,750 on utilities; $2,800 on travel; $3,065 on entertainment/meetings; $11,500 on office supplies.

The statement, sent to the general media but not to any Royal Gazette journalists who were working on Sunday, said: "The above-mentioned operating expenses exceed the amount not specifically outlined in response to Parliamentary questions on Friday.

"The Ministry of Tourism and Transport expects the additional funds are the result of money invested by Harvest Holdings. It should be noted that Harvest Holdings is not contractually required to divulge its own investments for the faith-based tourism initiative, but must explain how taxpayer funds were used for the project. That has been done."

It went on: "The Ministry of Tourism and Transport had hoped for better performance results from Harvest Holdings. Wherever feasible, the Ministry partners with local organisations to stimulate positive results for the local tourism industry. Nonetheless, in all the aforementioned cases, no evidence of financial wrongdoing or misuse of taxpayer money has been found."

Mr. Curtis did not answer his phone when contacted by this newspaper yesterday.

Were you at Weekend Fit For A King in September 2007? E-mail tsmith[[AT]]royalgazette.bm.