A REPORT and recommendation, based on the three bids made on the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo) estates, pending privatisation, was handed over to the National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited’s (NICIL) Steering Committee on Monday.

The documents were compiled by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), the consultant firm hired by NICL’s Special Purpose Unit (SPU) to oversee the privatisation of the Rose Hall; Enmore and Skeldon estates.

In recent years, the government moved to downsize the sugar industry to make GuySuCo more efficient. Some estates and factories were amalgamated and others were divested.
In keeping with the plan, in 2018, PwC announced that five bids for privatisation of the estates were received but they later narrowed this figure down to three, based on the bidders which met the information memorandum criteria.

Having been handed over, the information will be assessed by the Steering Committee. It will then be passed on to the government for Cabinet to make its final pronouncement.
Speaking with the Guyana Chronicle on Monday afternoon, PwC Managing Director (Deals), Wilfred Baghaloo, said that the documents were to be sent in by the end of the working day.

Giving the general details of what the report contained, he said: “[It entails] what our recommendations are in regards to those businesses; it will address the challenges that we’ve had in the privatisation process; it will address the opportunities as we see it and it will make recommendations on the way forward.”

Baghaloo opted not to speak on the three companies which withstood the PwC’s scrutiny over the past few weeks or the two which didn’t make the cut.

“The two companies were informed and they had not objected and they were informed that they were not in compliance with the information memorandum. But I prefer not to say who the two companies are that will be addressed by the Steering Committee,” he said.
However he did say that the work of the firm thus far had been “a very intricate process” which was being conducted meticulously.

In the report, the three bidders were ranked according to standard criteria of certain general areas.
Those included the company’s business plan; development plan; corporate governance principle; ability to finance the project; ability to finance the capital plans put together; the integration of the development plan with the community and price among others.

Questioned whether the firm was confident in the ranking put forward, Baghaloo said: “A lot has been learnt during the process. It was a tight process nevertheless…I think our ranking can stand to scrutiny.”

Moving forward, the government has the option of accepting, rejecting or restarting the bidding process, should the options put forward be assessed as unsatisfactory.