Dear Editor,
I was beyond livid on reading government’s response to and treatment of your news reporter seeking information about the recent Sparendaam deal (‘NICIL handled Pradoville 2 land transfer,’ November 18).
And the part of the story that got to me was this: “Stabroek News Editor-in-Chief Anand Persaud said… [Minister] Ali’s response to the reporter was most unbecoming of a minister of the government who must always be answerable to the public… it is apparent that there were uncomfortable details of the Sparendaam transaction that the government wanted to keep secret.”
That word ‘secret’ aptly describes the nature of government’s dealing with public funds and resources and your newspaper has a civic duty to keep exposing these secrets and shady dealings. I expect to be reading more about this issue.
And talking about secrecy, this is the core reason why I wholeheartedly welcome the promise by AFC presidential candidate, Mr Khemraj Ramjattan, for an AFC government to revisit the Skeldon and Amaila Falls projects, ‘AFC would revisit Skeldon and Amaila projects – Ramjattan’ (SN, Sunday, November 14).
In addition to those two, however, I would like to see the next government revisit the deals struck between the Jagdeo administration and Queens Atlantic II for the acquisition of the state-owned Guyana Pharmaceutical Corporation and Sanata Complex.
As with the Sparendaam story, I was just as livid when I read another SN story, ‘Government sole sourced over $1.4B in drugs from New GPC’ (November 7), in which the recently released Auditor General’s report for 2009 said the government paid over $1.4B to the New GPC in 2009 for the procurement of drugs and medical supplies based on sole sourcing approved by the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB).
And as with the secrecy surrounding the Sparendaam land deal for Pradoville 2, there is a great deal of secrecy surrounding government’s continued dealings with QAII, and while QAII is a private company and may not be willing to divulge information, government belongs to the people and is obligated to divulge information about its dealings.
This government’s continued most favoured treatment of QAII – from the sale of the two state properties to doing business with the owners – raises many red flags and demands that the next government revisits both the New GPC and Sanata Complex deals by a forensic auditing team.
Did QAII, which has been benefiting from sole-sourcing for its New GPC and to whom illegal concessions were granted for its Sanata Complex (before being corrected by Parliament), receive any financial and special favours from government that the public knows nothing about?
Mr Christopher Ram, in one of his usually enlightening pieces, had reason to describe one of the QAII deals as a ‘secret’ because government refused to divulge information, but ever since then we are getting a clearer picture why. This relationship between Queens Atlantic II, but especially its New GPC, and this government has become something of a conundrum and needs to be speedily resolved.
And what is even more unbelievable is the length of time this problem has been festering. For example, on June 26, 2009, SN reported, “The Health Ministry has come under the microscope again for drug purchases made in breach of procurement laws, according to the 2007 Auditor General’s Report, which has also revealed that some supplies sourced from the New Guyana Pharmaceutical Company Inc (New GPC) are still outstanding after two years.”
After two years? Before that, in 2005, government spent about $600M on New GPC products and this generated a parliamentary debate between Health Minister, Dr Leslie Ramsammy, and Mr Winston Murray (PNC-MP). Mr Murray’s principled position back then was two-fold: that sole sourcing should have ceased after the Procurement Act 2003 was passed, and that sole sourcing deprived government and taxpayers from knowing whether the items could have been obtained at a cheaper or lower price than that offered by the New GPC.
Mr Murray also made it clear that whereas it was okay prior to 2003 for government to resort to Cabinet or the NPTAB to make purchases, this practice had to stop once the Procurement Act was passed into law in 2003, allowing for the establishment of a Procurement Commission and the introduction of competitive bidding. Yet five years after that debate, the issue still persists, and seven years after the Procurement Act became law there still is no Procurement Commission as government continues to circumvent the Procurement Act (which calls for competitive bidding) by resorting to the NPTAB (which allows for sole sourcing).
Now, given the government’s highly favourable treatment of the New GPC, should it not be asked if this does not explain in large part why government appears reluctant to establish the Procurement Commission?
This is the same government that directed Gecom to advertise its procurement needs on the government website in an effort to assure transparency with public funds!
Editor, by the time the Procurement Commission is established so that competitive bidding can finally get underway after seven years, the New GPC would have raked in hundreds of millions of dollars for items it supplied without competitive bidding, the final disposition of many of which items the Auditor-General at times could not determine.
Meanwhile, of the four companies the Ministry of Health has publicly identified as competitive bidders to supply government with pharmaceutical and other medical items, QAII, whose New GPC is already the single biggest supplier of drugs and other medical supplies to government, has proposed two. Why should QAII be allowed to propose two suppliers? It is almost the same question I have been asking for a long time about QAII being allowed to acquire two major state entities – New GPC and Sanata Complex – and then turn around and do business with government with huge red flags fluttering.
Yours faithfully,
Emile Mervin
