The project was initiated by Member of Parliament Kern Spencer.

Parliament's Public Accounts Committee (PAC) was told yesterday that the goats were penned at a location in Elim, St Elizabeth, and left unattended for three months.

PAC members quizzed Moveta Munroe, head of the CDF unit, and Sean Baugh, an executive of the Rural Agricultural Development Authority (RADA), on the matter during a meeting of the committee in Gordon House.

Auditor General Pamela Monroe Ellis had conducted an audit and found several weaknesses in at least four projects in the constituency.

There were also concerns about stipulated procedures and guidelines.

The CDF executive told the PAC that after discovering the animals were not being distributed to livestock farmers as set out in the project, she intervened. The CDF got assistance from RADA to distribute the goats to some 44 registered farmers in the area.

"The goats were there for three months and the goats were starving and other stuff, so we had to do something," said Baugh.

And some committee members were up in arms when it was disclosed that a RADA official stamped the CDF project without authorisation. "The representative (Spencer) had just come into the office and ask for it to be stamped," Baugh informed the committee.

He said the irregularities were later discovered during the implementation of the programme.

Baugh said disciplinary action was taken against the RADA officer as she was suspended after it was found she "erred in judgement".

However, the RADA executive was asked to return to the PAC next week to face further questions. "When you come back you need to explain to us what is your monitoring process that you could have 80-odd starving goats, and your monitoring process did not inform you of this," said committee chairman Dr Omar Davies.