A TECHNICAL team from the Netherlands will arrive in the island shortly to probe last year's controversial donation to the People's National Party (PNP) by Trafigura Beheer.

A representative at the Netherlands Consulate in Kingston confirmed to The Gleaner yesterday that the team was on its way to Jamaica.

"I know that there is a technical team coming, I don't know when they are coming and how many the team consists of," the representative said.

"I am not aware of anything else," he said.

PNP chairman, Robert Pickersgill, meanwhile, said that he was unaware of any such development.

"No one who could vaguely be described as belonging to the Dutch authorities has contacted me about Trafigura," Mr. Pickersgill said yesterday.

On Tuesday, news surfaced that the Dutch investigators were interested in speaking with four PNP members, but neither Mr. Pickersgill nor the Netherlands representative was aware of this.

PNP not worried

And even if this is the case, the PNP said it was not worried. "What has been described as the Trafigura issue, I look forward to any inquiry," Mr. Pickersgill told The Gleaner.

The controversial Trafigura issue surfaced last year when Prime Minister Bruce Golding, whose party was then in opposition, said he had discovered the 'mother of all scandals'.

It surrounded a $31 million 'donation' which was lodged to a PNP account called CCOC Associates, which was linked to the party's former general secretary and information minister, Colin Campbell.

The PNP had said that the money was donation from Trafigura but representatives of its United Kingdom office said it was a "commercial agreement with CCOC Associates and payments were made under that agreement."