A law that will ensure more transparency in the way government contracts are administered might become implemented if the Virgin Islands Party (VIP) is elected as the next BVI government.
VIP Chairman and opposition leader Andrew Fahie is branding that law as the Contractor General legislation.
He said this legislation would ‘mirror’ the Recovery and Development Agency’s (RDA) mandate and ‘enhance’ the BVI/UK Protocols of Effective Financial Management agreement, which says: “All projects must be subjected to a tendering and procurement process that guarantees the highest level of transparency and fairness practicable.”
He said he wants to implement a Contractor General law because of post-hurricane reports that government had issued contracts without conducting the required tendering process.
“I have been singing for the last seven years – police ourselves or someone is going to police us in a manner that we all don’t like,” said Fahie on Wednesday during what he said was the first of a series of meetings he will hold as opposition leader.
Fahie said the Contractor General legislation will ‘prove to the world that the BVI can police itself when the RDA fulfils its mandate and is dissolved in the next five years.
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The Ministry of Public Health breached the country’s procurement regulations when it went to restricted tendering for the $366.9M in pharmaceuticals to HDM Labs last year and the act was condoned by the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB), former Auditor General Anand Goolsarran says.
He has also recommended that both the GPHC and the Ministry initiate annual prequalification of suppliers to prevent the need to engage in open tendering whenever supplies are needed.
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A Cabinet minister has described enforcement of the Construction Contractor’s Act and e-procurement as two of the greatest challenges facing the construction industry.
The electronic procurement process was recently launched by the Ministry of Finance for all public sector contracts, and Desmond Bannister, minister of works, warned: “Getting a contract from the government is not going to be an automatic thing. There are certain procedures that are being put in place, and which will have to be followed.
“Those contractors who decided not to show up to this seminar will miss out on some very important information which will be needed as we move forward.”
The minister spoke as he officially opened a contractor’s seminar yesterday at the Church of the Ascension Hall. The event was held by the Ministry of Public Works, and was designed to update Grand Bahama contractors on some of the new procedures set to be implemented by the ministry.
Some of the topics covered during the seminar included pre-qualification documents and assessment criteria; the Construction Contractor’s Act; contract pricing and payment procedures; project management; and site safety and e-procurement.
He thanked those who attended the seminar, but expressed disappointment in what he called a “poor showing” for Grand Bahama.
“We are introducing new procedures to the Ministry of Public Works, including our pre-qualification process, and no one should take it for granted that they are going to get work from the Ministry of Public Works,” said Mr Bannister.
“All of you would be given a pre-qualification form, and it will be important for each of you to pre-qualify. It is going to be a new era of transparency in how we do work. The world is changing, so the information that we will be disseminating in this seminar will be very important.”
Mr Bannister told the contractors that the success of the Ministry of Public Works is very much in the hands of the private sector, as the government seeks to develop the building environment in The Bahamas.
“What I have found since coming to the ministry is that many contractors do not use the services of a quantity surveyor, and often rely on their experiences to calculate and tender prices, which often leads to a wide range of prices coming into the Ministry of Public Works,” said Mr Bannister.
“I have seen this too often, where someone comes in too low and someone comes in too high. Quantity surveyors at my Ministry are working to develop standards to help contractors. In doing that we plan to bring uniformity to our pricing structure.”
The minister added that he is well aware there are contractors who have difficulty in trying to get paid in a timely fashion by the Ministry of Public Works for works that have already been completed.
He said the session on payment procedures was designed to give contractors insight on all the information required when an invoice is submitted, so as to minimise the amount of time it takes for them to be paid.
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PUBLIC Works Minister Desmond Bannister was very disappointed over the poor turnout to a one-day seminar hosted by his ministry for local contractors in Grand Bahama.
The seminar was held to bring contractors up to speed with the new procedures that are being introduced in the Ministry of Works, including its Pre-qualification process.
Nobody should take for granted that they are going to get work from the Ministry of Public Works, Mr Bannister told those assembled at the Church of the Ascension Hall in Freeport. Getting a contract from the Government is not going to be an automatic thing.”
This is a very important seminar that the ministry has gone all the way to ensure it is successful, but we are not very impressed with the showing.”
Topics covered during the seminar included pre-qualification documents and assessment criteria, Construction Contractor’s Act, contract pricing and payment procedures, project management and site safety and E-procurement.
Minister Bannister stressed that many contractors do not use the services of a Quantity surveyor to calculate tender prices, and noted that such services would assist them tremendously.
He also indicated that the Ministry in collaboration with the Department of Information Technology is in the process of update Contractor’s Database, and the Tendering and payment certificate process.
The minister stressed that updating their database is very important.
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The manner in which drugs and other materiel associated with the delivery of services at the state-run health care institutions in Guyana are acquired has long been the subject of animated public chatter that often alights upon the subject of the circumvention of tender regulations and excursions into what are believed to be optional corrupt practices. These discourses have, from time to time, implicated well-placed public functionaries believed to be ‘in tight’ with political operatives whom, it is felt, give the green light to corruption-driven practices. What has, over time, lent currency to alleged corrupt practices in the health sector that assign lucrative contracts without adherence to tender procedures is the fact that the investigations into alleged irregularities rarely if ever appear to be prosecuted with any real sense of vigour and diligence, a circumstance that has led to the widespread view that there is usually no great eagerness to probe discrepancies and find guilty parties. Over time, those who fret over tender irregularities resign themselves to the notion that the arbitrary circumvention of laid down tender procedures is part of what is loosely described as ‘the capture of the state’ by those who hold the reins of power.
We do not have to go too far back to discover that the manner in which a particular private sector entity made a ‘pretty penny’ out of being a favoured purchaser of drugs ordered by the Government of Guyana, an arrangement that was underpinned by the blatant evasion of the state tender process. What applied instead was an open regimen of ‘deals’ in which the state functionary/functionaries entered into bilateral arrangements with pre-determined buyers and from which those functionaries reportedly benefitted handsomely. One might add of course that other state agencies have also been known to circumvent National Procurement and Tender Administration procedures in arrangements which are said to involve bribes and kickbacks.
Two points should be made at this juncture. First, of course, there can arise circumstances of an emergency nature that give rise to the need to circumvent the tender process in the interest of a timely response to emergencies within the health system. In such cases it is absolutely important that we ensure that the departure from standard practice is attended by a generous measure of fairness and transparency. Indeed, in circumstances where the customary tender process has to be set aside to respond to an emergency then there is all the more reason why the circumstances must be verified and properly documented. Whether any such documentation customarily takes place is unclear.
The second point to be made here is that state purchases for medical supplies to meet the needs of our health services regularly run into hundreds of millions of dollars and it is therefore not difficult to see where once you set aside the tender procedure leaving the arrangements to an alternative regime there is a good chance that you could end up with a situation that is vulnerable to all sorts of irregularities. We have, over the years, grown used to those stories of one sort or another regarding ‘deals’ in which businesses have been favoured to supply drugs and other medical equipment in a manner that has given rise to a regimen of kickbacks from which backroom manipulators have benefitted. By this time we know enough to be aware that some of those stories are entirely true.
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