Overpayments were again on the radar of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) on Monday, when it continued its scrutiny of the Auditor General’s reports for the years 2010 and 2011 on the various Regional Democratic Coun-cils (RDCs).
Facing the committee was a delegation from Region 5, headed by its Regional Executive Officer (REO) Ashford Ambedkar.
In all, the Auditor General highlighted seven instances of overpayments, including “Overpayments of salaries to officers totalling $4.831M and the related deductions for the years 2005-2010.” According to the Auditor General, the amounts were paid on behalf of teachers who had left their jobs without giving sufficient notice to the region.
Ambedkar stated that if the information had been received by his office earlier, he may have been able to put a stop on the payments as well as deductions before they were made to the bank and the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) and the National Insurance Scheme (NIS), respectively.
As it relates to the recouping of these funds, the region reported that a fire which ravaged the Regional Administration building in 2006 also destroyed the list containing the persons who were to make repayments for 2005 and 2006. However, for years 2007, 2009 and 2010, the region stated that continuous efforts are still being pursued to have the repayments made.
As it relates to overpaid deductions, the region said that “amounts totalling $108,148 and $75,547 were recovered from GRA and NIS for year 2007 and 2009 respectively.” Follow up letters dispatched to the GRA and the NIS requesting recovery of outstanding amounts have been met with no response by the two agencies.
Also contained in the report was the fact that “overpayments totalling $2.315M made to contractors in respect of five projects for the years 2007-2009 were not recovered.” In this instance, the region said it successfully recovered $497,000 as of March, 2012, for rehabilitative works to East to West Back Streets, Hopetown. It was also reported that $756,000 had been refunded from works done to Sydney Street, Woodley Park. The region, however, stated that the contractor who owed a total of $272,000 for works to No.8 Secondary School had passed away and that attempts to recoup the sums from the executors of his estate have so far been futile. A further $847,000 was also said to be outstanding with regards to works done to St. John Street, Hopetown.
Other instances of overpayments by the region involved amounts totalling $27,000 and $82,500 made to contractors in respect of the rehabilitation of the Belladrum Secondary School and the road leading to Ithaca Health Centre, respectively, for the year 2009. The region has since been able to recover the full amount in both instances, according to its report.
It was noted that one of the contractors who owed funds to the region was still granted contracts for other works.
Overpayments totalling $110,635 were also made to a contractor in respect to the rehabilitation of the lower flat of the Moraikobai Primary School. It was also reported that some of the works done were substandard. When asked about efforts to recoup these sums, Ambedkar stated that the contractor, when contacted, had indicated that he was not in the financial position to repay the sums being asked for, but would refund the sum as soon as he was able to do so.
It should be noted that in each of these cases, it was evident that the region’s engineer—responsible for inspecting and signing off on works done by the contractors—had neglected to carry out their duties efficiently. Committee members stated that the fact that the works had indeed been looked at by the engineer, who signed off on them and authorised payment, was a major concern and needed immediate addressing.
The region promised the committee that measures were being put in place to prevent any further mistakes, although these measures were not spelt out.
Several of these discrepancies, including outstanding amounts totalling $27,000 and $1.173M for works to the Belladrum Secondary School and four other contracts, respectively, turned up again in the Auditor General’s 2011 report, although it was stated that the smaller amount was eventually recovered.
