The Ministry of Public Works in collaboration with The Department of Information Technology is in the process of updating its contractor database, and also its tendering and payment certificate processes.
Stemming from the Ministry’s preparation for the New Providence School Repair Programme, Director of Public Works, Melanie Roach, said it was decided that this would be the opportune time to kill two birds with one stone.
“The technical staff at the Ministry determined that a seminar would be the most effective way of imparting the information contractors will require to successfully tender for projects and once awarded a contract to navigate smoothly through the management of the construction process and provide the information required to ensure timely payments,” she said.
“All of this is in an effort to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the Ministry of Public Works and the ease of doing business with the Government of the Commonwealth of The Bahamas,” she added.
Ms. Roach, encourages all contractors interested in participating in the procurement process for government capital works projects to attend the seminar and this includes for works of all types and valued from $1 to multi-millions of dollars.
The topics for the seminar include: contract pricing and payment procedures, pre-qualification documents and assessment criteria, e-procurement, project management and site safety, and the construction contractor’s act.
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As of 25 May 2018, the new General Date Protection Regulations (GDPR) is finally in force in European Union (EU’), having in formally adopted over two years prior. In the lead-up to this new regime, people and businesses all over the world have been trying to put their house in order, to ensure they complied with the provisions.
Similar to its predecessor, the 1995 Data Protection Directive, the GDPR is different. In a nutshell, the GDPR not only applies to organisations located within the EU, but also applies to organisations located outside of the EU – if they offer goods or services to, or monitor the behaviour of, individuals who reside within the EU. The long reach of the GDPR – its inter-territorial reach – has caused numerous organisations re-examine their systems and approach to the handling of personal data, in order to avoid the stiff fines the EU is prepared to levy when breaches are determined.
Within the Caribbean procurement space, the spectre of the GDPR may not be as acute in the first instance. With the most projects being in the Caribbean region, for the region, they tend to fall beyond the scope of the GDPR. However, work Caribbean Consultants, Contractors and Vendors (of goods and services) might be executed for or on behalf of European firms, or targeting European residents, the GDPR becomes an important consideration.
To that end, there is a wealth of resources online, such as the EU GDPR Information Portal, which details the Regulations, along with key issues that should be given particular attention. We also recommend that you listen to the ICT Pulse Podcast episode, in which the nuts and bolts of the GDPR are discussed with Caribbean attorney-at-law, Bartlett Morgan.
In terms of practical things you can do, and as a starting point, we suggest the following tip to help you (and your team) stay on the right side of the GDPR, as well many of the data protection regimes that are being implemented across the Caribbean region:
1. Fully understand why you are collecting and holding the data that is in your (and/or your organisation’s) possession. Under the GDPR, the data owners are entitled to know why you are holding their data and how it is being used.
2. Map how data, and personal data flows through your organization, along with the systems and resources that are used. Assess the risk: whether all of the steps, systems, actors, etc.., are needed; the extent to which the data could be compromised; and whether there might be better/more efficient and effective ways to derive the purpose for which the data is being kept.
3. Stop collecting data you don’t have a legitimate need for, and recognized that data such as IP addresses and other online identifiers as personal data, which now fall under the scope of the GDPR.
4. Review how long you retain individuals; data for, and how it is stored and secured. You should not retain individuals’ personal data any longer that you need to, and appropriate arrangements should be made to ensure that the data is properly and safely stored.
5. Review and update your business’ (and its website’s) privacy notices to provide the additional information required by the GDPR.
6. Amend all of your data contracts – especially if you are in the business collecting data, processing data, market research, or even conducting surveys – to ensure they are GDPR-compliant.
7. Pay attention to the third-party entities you might be using to process, or otherwise handle data on your behalf. Ensure that their data privacy and terms of use policies are also aligned with the GDPR, to reduce the chance of difficulties in the future.
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Reporting to the Manager IT Services, the successful candidate will be responsible for:
– Setting and continually managing project expectations with team members and other stakeholders; planning and scheduling project timelines and milestones using appropriate tools and track project milestones and deliverables;
– Defining project scope, goals and deliverables that support business goals in collaboration with senior management and stakeholders; this will include the development of business cases;
– Effectively communicating project expectations to team members and stakeholders in a timely and clear fashion; liaising with project stakeholders on an ongoing basis;
– Conducting project post mortems and create a recommendations report in order to identify successful and unsuccessful project elements.
– Managing the development and deployment of new applications, systems software, and/or enhancements to existing applications throughout the enterprise.
– Defining project success criteria and disseminate them to involved parties throughout project life cycle and determine the frequency and content of status reports from the project team, analyze results, and troubleshoot problem areas.
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OPPOSITION spokesman on finance Mark Golding has welcomed the Bill to amend the Public Procurement Act, which, he said, will serve to enhance the associated processes involved in the system.
“We support the thrust of this legislation and any attempts to improve it, and we also hope that as it is rolled out, the training to support it will be such that we will see far more efficient execution of the procurement processes in the public sector than have been achieved in the past,” he said.
Golding was making his contribution to the debate on the Bill in the House of Representatives on Wednesday.
The legislation seeks to regulate the procurement of goods, works and services by agencies.
Golding noted that the principal law, the Public Procurement Act, was passed in 2015 to introduce a modern procurement system with clear rules, and the necessary institutional base to ensure fairness, transparency and efficiency.
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The on-again, off-again redevelopment of Hewanorra International Airport (HIA) in Vieux Fort, Saint Lucia, is once again consuming the time and attention of policymakers, the business community and the people of Saint Lucia.
There is much justified discussion and speculation, given that this is the largest infrastructure project to be undertaken in Saint Lucia (apart from the DSH/citizenship by investment horse racing facility), amid calls for total transparency, accountability and prudence.
In an address to the Parliament on March 21, 2018, Stephenson King, minister for infrastructure, ports, energy and labour, said, “The current administration intends to bring the airport project back to the gates of execution before the end of this year.”
There has been major concern with regard to financing and successfully positioning HIA operations to compete and remain viable.
There is also much local suspicion that the political directorate is caught up in personal interests that override those of the public at large in the light of recent awards of multiple no-bid contracts to political and personal cronies, allegations of bribery, and material omissions in public statements by the government.
There was an assertion of “probable cause” in a corruption probe undertaken by the previous administration in relation to an earlier iteration of the HIA redevelopment project set out in a letter to the US Department of Justice requesting mutual legal assistance in relation to US businessman Antonio Assenza and promises by the current Saint Lucia prime minister, Allen Chastanet, to “investigate the investigation”.
Assenza and his local company Asphalt & Mining (St Lucia) Company Limited (A&M) were targets of the airport project corruption investigation, while one of the ministers implicated, Guy Joseph, welcomed the corruption probe.
Chastanet said in his recent budget address: “Redevelopment of HIA will take place in a phased manner using concessional loan financing. We are currently finalizing the loan agreement with the Republic of China (Taiwan) for the US$100 million required. The US$15 million a year in airport tax will be used as security against repayment of the loan.”
Leader of the opposition, Philip J. Pierre, replied to the policy statement, saying: “The government has rejected the public private partnership agreement that would have been supervised and monitored by the IFC, an arm of the World Bank.
“All plans for the construction of a modern state of the art Hewanorra International Airport had been finalized by the last Labour government with work about to commence without the government incurring any related debt. The airport would have been leased for a period of 30 years, at the end of which commercial control would revert back to the government of St Lucia. This arrangement had three major benefits: oversight of the project would have been done by a competent agent of the World Bank — the IFC; there would be no additional debt incurred by the government of St Lucia and we would have had a long awaited state of the art international airport.
“Having rejected and cancelled this agreement in September 2017, the government was offered by the investment arm of the Canadian government to enter into a memorandum of understanding to provide all the expertise in designing, financing, constructing and delivering the airport and the north south highway. The project would have been guaranteed by the Canadian government with no need for debt financing by the government of Saint Lucia.”
With the knowledge there was an approved transaction structure for the HIA public private partnership (PPP) already in place since January 2015, Pierre continued:
1. “Why is the government persistent in trying to avoid dealing with reputable international agencies that encourage good governance especially as it relates to procurement rules?
2. “We appear to be revisiting the age of A&M, which is still a subject of investigation by the US Attorney.
3. “When the UWP last governed in 2011, A&M had failed the due diligence test and its proposal to undertake work at HIA was rejected by the Deutsche Bank.
4. “What are the contractual relationships between this government and this company or its look-a-like for the redevelopment of HIA?
5. “The prime minister needs to clarify the procurement methods and whether an open tender process will be used given the size of this HIA redevelopment project.”
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