FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
\nNOVEMBER 13, 2024<\/p>\n
Blame Sharing \u2013 Procurement system in crisis<\/p>\n
It is well established that the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB)
\nalong with the pool of evaluators are under immense criticism for recommendations to procuring
\nentities, of contract awards to questionable contractors. The team of evaluators have been blamed
\npublicly for using arbitrary evaluation criteria in the determination of contract awards. In some
\ninstances, the lowest evaluated bidders are not even recommended for contract awards.<\/p>\n
The President in his infamous 5:30 am, meeting yesterday sought to assign blame to the
\npermanent secretaries, engineers and contractors for incomplete projects. The hypocrisy is
\nperverse, ironic and mind blowing as it is the government\u2019s institutional system which facilitated
\nthe award of these contracts that the President so laments are incomplete; and now blames public
\nservants rather than his subject ministers.<\/p>\n
Is this a misguided attempt to save his government face from allegations of corruption through
\nthe national procurement system, now that 2025 elections looms?<\/p>\n
A perusal of contract awards recommended by NPTAB demonstrates an inequitable distribution
\nof same in an already fractured society – unequal income gap, marginalised businesses (perceived
\nas non- supporters of the current administration) and limited practise of procuring goods and
\nservices in rural communities.<\/p>\n
These practices are fostering the inequality of opportunities for the population in construction
\nand services in oil rich Guyana, where billions are expended for procurement, most notably in
\nconstruction projects. And it is clear that a small percentage of the chosen elite benefit from
\ngovernment procurement- the lion share is concentrated and allocated to the few while the
\nmasses are given the crumbs in manual labour contracts. Are all groups benefiting equally from
\nGuyana\u2019s oil revenues?<\/p>\n
Government procurement which is also referred to public procurement or public tendering is the
\nprocurement of goods and services on behalf of a public authority, such as a government agency.<\/p>\n
Research has shown that in countries with high levels of corruption (Guyana CPI score is 40)
\nless money is spent on welfare such as health and education but massive investments are made
\non infrastructure spending which offer a greater potential for bribery and minimise the risk of
\nsubsequent auditing.<\/p>\n
Is in now an established norm that public procurement contract awards are failing to start at
\nstipulated time, sub-standard or incomplete work along with those contracts which have been
\nrecalled by the Ministry of Public Works. One of the most infamous contract awards to Tepui<\/p>\n
Group Inc for the construction of the Belle Vue pump station failed most of the evaluation
\ncriteria and has failed the project timelines with the mobilisation fund of $160.8 m. This has even
\nengaged the attention of the Auditor General. Yet, Tepui Group Inc has been awarded another
\nmulti-million contract from the Central Housing and Planning Authority (CHPA) and as revealed
\nin the infamous 5:30am meeting, this project is also more than four months delayed.<\/p>\n
It is no secret that Tepui\u2019s principal, Mikhail Rodrigues known as Guyanese Critics is closely
\naffiliated with the Vice President. Some Evaluators have refused to sign off on contract awards
\nand some have resigned when such questionable and controversial contract awards
\nrecommendations are made to procuring entities.<\/p>\n
The Alliance of Change has observed that public servants have been thrown in the deep end and
\npublicly shamed and blamed for breaches in the procurement system while NPTAB sits on the
\nsidelines. In this context, the AFC would like to encourage public servants that their
\nresponsiveness to the government of the day has limits.<\/p>\n
The principle of constrained partisanship places limitation on responsiveness. Public servants are
\ncareer bureaucrats and are expected to serve alternate governments with equal loyalty and
\nresponsiveness as – \u2018apolitical.\u2019 An obvious slant of partisanship to one government can
\nundermine confidence to serve a subsequent government. The AFC reminds that if there is a
\ncrisis of obligation between the conflicting demands of ministers and their higher loyalty to
\nparliament and the public interest, the latter is above the interest of the government of the day.<\/p>\n
The AFC supports the principle of integrity in public office which obligates public servants to
\nact professionally and not politically. Reject and if not possible document all acts which you
\nregard as either illegal or unethical. It is documentation which will ultimately protect and save
\nyou. Integrity goes beyond what is required in the law and includes professional judgment in
\nprocedural values of fairness, honesty and accountability in government institutions such as,
\nfairness in handling a public tender or accuracy in framing public information.<\/p>\n
The AFC encourages all public servants to be fearless in executing their functions. Your loyalty
\nis to the Country not the unethical and or illegal requests of the politicians. END<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE NOVEMBER 13, 2024 Blame Sharing \u2013 Procurement system in crisis It is well established that the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB) along with the pool of evaluators are under immense criticism for recommendations to procuring entities, of contract awards to questionable contractors. The team of evaluators have been blamed publicly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6741,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9435","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latestnews"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/WhatsApp-Image-2020-09-30-at-5.04.08-PM.jpeg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4F7T1-2sb","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9435","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9435"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9435\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6741"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9435"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9435"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/afcguyana.com\/afcnew\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9435"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}