Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) Irfaan Ali has revealed that there were only six nominees for membership of the Public Procurement Commission prior to the recent month-long extension for submissions.
Ali said that the PAC simply wasn’t satisfied with the number of submissions. Article 212X (1) of the Constitution states “the Public Procurement Commission shall consist of five members who shall have expertise and experience in procurement, legal, financial and administrative matters” and (2) “the President shall appoint the members of the Commis-sion after such members have been nominated by the Public Accounts Committee and approved by not less than two-thirds of the elected members of the National Assembly.”
This would mean that the candidates would have to have the approval of both sides of the House.
Speaking to Stabroek News, the PPP/C Member of Parliament said that the stakeholders have express-ed interest in the nomination process and it was now imperative for them to act. He said that the PAC is advertising the new February 19, 2016 nomination deadline but it has already been decided by the parliamentary committee that there would be no further extension.
Ali stated that he did not want to comment on the six submissions but did note that with the extension religious organisations, the Private Sector Commis-sion, the Guyana Manufac-turing and Services Association along with the political parties and others are being encouraged to provide nominations.
He said that since there will be no other extension the PAC will be finalising the process by the end of March. Ali said that “we have been speaking about it. We hope we can have more responses and we also agreed it would be our final extension. We are looking to conclude by March.”
The chairman defended the work by the PAC stating that since the inception of the 11th parliament the committee has had the PPC nominations at the forefront. The APNU+AFC government had promised the PPC within its first 100 days in office.
In November of last year, the PAC commenced advertising for nominees.
In Sunday’s Stabroek News the Parliament Office in a notice said that it is the wish of the PAC that the composition of the PPC reflects as far as possible the social, gender and political makeup of the country. In keeping with this decision, the PAC said it was now seeking names from a reasonably wide cross-section of society. It therefore invited stakeholders, political parties, civil organisations and individuals who have an interest in the establishment of the PPC to submit the names of persons eligible to be commissioners.
Submissions have to be addressed to the Clerk of the Committee, Public Accounts Committee, Committees Division, Parliament Office, Public Buildings, Brickdam.
The Parliament Office ran advertisements for weeks prior to the submission deadline of December 23, 2015 alerting interested persons to apply or provide a nomination.
For years, the PPP/C while in office had haggled with the PNCR, APNU and the AFC over candidates for the PPC and how many should be nominated by either side.
Both APNU and the AFC, while in opposition, had lobbied for the removal of Cabinet’s “no-objection” role in the procurement process. Accord-ing to the Procurement Act, Cabinet shall have the right to review all procurements, the value of which exceeds $15 million. However, once the PPC is commissioned, Cabinet’s no-objection powers will be phased out so as to decentralise the procurement process.
Though the Act was implemented in 2003, the Cabinet still holds full powers as it relates to its role in the procurement process owing to the fact that the PPC has not been constituted. Cabinet presently signals its no-objection to contracts and only then can they proceed. This “no-objection” role had been strongly opposed by APNU and AFC when they were in opposition.
