–Dr. Jagdeo affirms, says those bidding for contracts will be vetted

THE Government of Guyana, in a move to ensure transparency prevails and corruption is stamped out, intends to train those public servants who are part of the procurement system, People’s Progressive Party (PPP) General Secretary Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo said.

For quite some time, the government has been rolling out measures to enhance the procurement system, and during his weekly news conference on Thursday at the party’s headquarters, Dr. Jagdeo remained firm on this stance, and highlighted the outcome of his recent interactions with the contractors of Region Two (Pomeroon-Supenaam).

The PPP General Secretary, who also serves as Guyana’s Vice President, said that during his visit to Region Two, the tendering authorities were given a stern warning not to operate outside of the Procurement Act.

The PPP General Secretary then firmly stated that there is no room for departure from the Procurement Act unless “explicit approval” has been given by the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB) and the Ministry of Finance (MoF).

Dr Jadgdeo further stated that too often the government has found departures from the standard bidding documents that are part of the legislation.

The PPP General Secretary later said: “Sometimes depending on who is the procuring officer who heads the procurement system, they can alter the bidding document, which should be standard.

That should not happen and so they asked for more training because they said there’s a high turnover of staff and therefore a lot of people are doing this because they need better training and so, we are committing to better training of the staff who are doing procurement and to make sure that they have a clear understanding of what our expectations are and how the system should operate. It should be fair.”

He also said that within the various regions, there must be an examination of who owns the companies that are bidding and the tendering authorities must start cleansing the list in order to remove those individuals who are attempting to deceive the system under false pretenses.

The PPP General Secretary then issued a stern warning to contractors once again and outlined the government’s expectations.

He said: “We intend to rigidly enforce the law. We expect good quality work and we intend to blacklist people who do shoddy work.”

Dr Jagdeo recently disclosed that the government has plans to conduct ‘sting’ operations to clamp down on officers and other personnel who engage in procurement breaches.

Dr. Jagdeo told local journalists that the government has undertaken a review of the procurement system at every level.

“Let me put on notice all of those people who are responsible for procurement in public corporations, statutory bodies, the ministries, the regions, central ministry, everywhere, all the way to the National Tender Board,” the General Secretary said firmly.

The government, he related, is examining the procurement procedures for compliance, and activities for compliance with the laws.

If persons are found to be in breach of the law, Dr. Jagdeo affirmed, they will be held accountable.

“Let me make it clear, if we find that those officers are skirting the provisions of the procurement law, then there shall be consequences for them, because too often we hear people come and they complain that in some remote parts of this country, somebody is doing something,” he said.
The government, he also related, will be scrutinising delays in processing contract payments, and dishonest supervisory on projects.