— says company rep turned up uninvited

By Ravin Singh
ALLEGATIONS of the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) promising Fedders-Lloyd the contract to design and build the Specialty Hospital after the project had folded temporarily were dismissed entirely by former President Donald Ramotar, who was fingered in the controversial deal.Speaking with the Guyana Chronicle on Saturday last, regional representative of Fedders-Lloyd Ajay Jha had revealed that the company, after losing the initial bid to Surendra Engineering Company Limited, was in constant contact with the PPP government after Surendra Engineering left late last year.
In 2012, Surendra was awarded the multimillion-dollar contract by the then government to design and build the hospital at Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown. However, the agreement between the two was prematurely terminated subsequent to discoveries of alleged failure to account for public funds and alleged engagement in fraud by the contracting company.
With India providing a US$18 million line of credit to construct the facility, Surendra had drawn US$3,636,000 as a mobilisation advance. Additionally, the sum of $1.25 billion was also set aside for the hospital in the 2013 Budget, but was axed by the then opposition.
Some $34.4 million was allocated to the hospital as part of a supplementary budget. But following the termination of the contract, the PPP was subsequently voted out of office and the project was stalled.
With justification, the coalition government resuscitated the initiative, and inked a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Fedders-Lloyd, which is likely to see the contract being awarded to the company for the completion of the hospital.
However, providing photographs of himself and Ramotar in India, in January of this year, Jha told this publication that the two had facilitated extensive discussions during this time on the future of the project.
He said assurance was given by the then President that Fedders-Lloyd would be the company to continue the project after Surendra Engineering had packed up and left, due to the alleged irregularities and fraud. These claims by Jha surfaced at a time when the PPP has sought to criticise the government for signing the MoU with Fedders-Lloyd.
However, Ramotar, in addressing Jha’s statements disclosed that there was indeed a meeting between the two during his visit to India earlier in the year. This trip, he said, was in response to an invitation extended by India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi to a conference where he (Ramotar) was the chief guest.

INFORMAL MEETING
As it relates to the meeting, the former President explained that it had been a very informal one, which was motivated by courtesy on his behalf. He noted that Jha had been camping out in the lobby of the hotel he (Ramotar) was staying, awaiting the opportunity to meet him.
The former President refuted claims that at this meeting promises were made by him to award the contract to Fedders-Lloyd. He said that he indicated to the company’s representative that there would be a re-tendering process, given the developments with the project at that time, and that Fedders-Lloyd, if they were still interested in the project, should bid when the time would have arisen.
He maintained that no promise was made in this regard, since the law stipulates the procedures that have to be followed.
“I never went to India with the intention of meeting him or any Fedders-Lloyd representative,” Ramotar said. Jha also revealed that former Attorney General (AG) Anil Nandlall had met him on more than 10 occasions between December 2014 and April 2015, and Nandlall had verbally promised him that Fedders-Lloyd would be awarded the contract.
To support his argument, he revealed that the former AG requested him to write to the government, indicating that the company was interested in picking up the remains of the project and completing it.
He presented the written documents which were sent to the Office of the President, the Attorney General’s office, and the Ministries of Finance and Health. Jha, however, could not provide any document of response from any of these offices.

UNINVITED VISITS
And in his defence, Nandlall told the Guyana chronicle yesterday that while he did meet Jha at his chambers, it was done after several uninvited visits by him to the AG’s Chambers. But according to Nandlall, no promise was ever made to the company representative since he (Nandlall) was not in a position to award any contract to any company.
On Saturday though, Jha had told this publication that the companies disqualified were the Vedhehi Group which submitted no form of documentation and Jaguar Overseas which submitted its documents electronically, via a CD. As such, the two remaining companies, Surendra Engineering Company Limited and Fedders-Lloyd were the only two legitimate bidders in the process, according to him. Further defending the company’s position, the representative committed to sourcing the document from India which highlights that a list of equipment proposed for the project was indeed submitted.
When quizzed on why the PPP never initiated any moves to commence the awarding of the contract to his company, Jha explained that it was at the height of the May 11 General and Regional Elections and he was asked to wait until the elections were over.
But Nandlall also refuted this, arguing that Surendra Engineering’s contract had been terminated even before general elections were announced. As such, if the then government had any intention of granting Fedders-Lloyd the contract, they had more than enough time to do so.