Leader of the Alliance for Change Khemraj Ramjattan says his party is working on compromise amendments that would see Cabinet being able to make a complaint against an award to the Public Procurement Commission (PPC) which will then rule on it.
This course of action came out of a recent meeting held between the AFC and the Private Sector Commission (PSC).
“I should be finished with the amendments before the end of the holidays,” Ramjattan told Stabroek News. “I already drafted them. They are in keeping with the fact that thePublic Procurement Commission would be the supreme body rather than the Cabinet,” said Ramjattan in a comment to this newspaper on Tuesday.
The AFC had long stated that support for the resuscitated Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (Amendment) Bill will only be supported by the party if the Government sets up the Procurement Commission and makes no further move to preserve the present no-objection provision that Cabinet holds over contracts greater than $15 million.
During the meeting, the PSC acknowledged the position of the AFC and pointed out that the PSC, has on more than one occasion, urged the government in writing to appoint the Procurement Commission as is required by the Constitution.
As a compromise, the PSC proposed to the AFC that the Procurement Act should be amended to give Cabinet the right to a no-objection for contracts proposed by the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board even after the Procurement Commission has been set up.
“An objection can only be made if Cabinet believes that the procedures laid out in the Procurement Act were not adhered to. This is in the existing Act already,” the PSC stated. “Cabinet’s objection should be made to the Procurement Commission as an oversight and appellate body, who will then review the reasons for the objection and make a ruling. If the Procurement Commission disagrees with the grounds for objection and finds that the law was adhered to as per the Procurement Act, then permission will be granted to the National Tender Board to proceed with the awarding of the contract as recommended by them without referral back to the Cabinet,” the PSC recommended.
“If the Procurement Commission agrees with the objection, then the matter is sent to the National Tender Board to remedy the shortcomings and sent back to the Cabinet for their no objection”, the PSC proposed.
The PSC said that once the Act is amended by parliament and assented to by the President, the Procurement Commission should be installed with urgency. It called for adequate funding to be provided to ensure that the PPC can carry out its function effectively.
New GPC
Ramjattan pointed to the importance of the PPC to the procurement process to ensure contracts are awarded fairly. He said too that the Government has again shifted the goalposts to make it nigh impossible for any other entity apart from New GPC to bid for medical supplies and drug contracts.
“The Government knows that one of its biggest suppliers of pharmaceuticals and medicines will come under severe scrutiny if the PPC becomes operational,” he said. “This supplier we all know is New GPC which supplies over $4 billion per annum to the Health Ministry and Public Hospital Georgetown and other Government health departments and agencies,” he said.
“Knowing that crunch time is around and that pressure from the PSC and other NGOs will force it to establish the PPC, the Government is not hiding its bias towards this company,” he said.
“In the newly released ‘2014 to 2016 pre-qualification criteria for the supply and delivery of pharmaceuticals and medical supplies’ issued on December 18, 2013, Government has stacked the scales heavily in favour of this company,” he said. “For this new two-year period it has left the goalposts open for only New GPC to score, and from what I am seeing here only New GPC, as a local company, will pre-qualify,” he said.
According to Ramjattan, a maximum of 10 points will be scored if a company has a turnover of $1 billion and net assets of $500 million and contributing at least $50 million as corporate taxes. “This alone will exclude all others who are known local suppliers!” Ramjattan charged.
“Moreover, maximum points will be given to the company having 50 employees with an average time on the job for three years. And further, on a ten-point scale, a maximum will be given to the company with warehouse facility,” he said.
“These three criteria mean that nobody can compete now with New GPC although I am aware other local companies can bring in the identical pharmaceuticals and medicines at five times and sometimes 10 times less the price Government has to pay New GPC!”, he said.
He added that these new rules and some of the old ones made now by the Tender Board which all favour friends and family, would all have been scrapped if there were a PPC in place.
“Under the Constitution making new rules and setting fair criteria for a level playing field for all competitors in the bidding process is the function of the PPC. I hope people are now appreciating why the PPC has not been established and become operational by this PPP Government all these years…and why the AFC is so adamant that it must be in January 2014 and no later,” Ramjattan stated.
