Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of Parliament Jermaine Figueira has formally submitted to the National Assembly the names of Pauline Chase, Joel Bhagwandin, Rajnarine Singh, Diana Rajcumar and Berkley Wickham to constitute the Public Procurement Commission (PPC).
Figueira presented the report of the PAC on the appointment of members to the PPC at last Wednesday’s sitting of the House.
The report outlined the steps taken to arrive at the five names all of which – with the exception of Rajcumar – were not on the initial shortlists.
The Constitution provides that, “Subject to paragraph (2), members of the Commission shall be appointed for three years and shall be eligible for re-appointment, for one other term of office, not earlier than three years after the end of their first term. (2) Of those members first appointed, two shall hold office for four years.”
The first PPC was established in October 2016, which was more than 13 years after the Constitution was amended to cater for the procurement oversight body. The first members were Carol Corbin, Sukrishnalall Pasha, Emily Dodson, Ivor English and former Minister of Labour Nanda Kishore Gopaul. Corbin, a former project management professional and accountant with decades of experience working at the CARICOM Secretariat, was elected Chairperson of the Commission.
The life of the Commission came to an end in October 2019 but after then-President David Granger intervened, the tenures of Corbin and Gopaul were extended for one year to facilitate a transition phase.
There has been no PPC since October of 2020 and billions of dollars worth of public works contracts have been awarded.
The PAC said that the five nominees have all been cleared by the Guyana Police Force and are eligible to constitute the Commission. Initially, economist Rawle Lucas was named as a nominee of the Commission but his name was withdrawn by the APNU+AFC and replaced with Rajcumar.
The other APNU+AFC nominee to the Commission is Wickham while the governing PPP/C nominated attorney at law Chase, financial analyst Bhagwandin and Singh.
Bhagwandin’s nomination had raised eyebrows since he was recently appointed Managing Director of TriStar, the shore base company owned by Florida, USA-based Guyanese Kris Persaud.
The National Assembly will now have to vote on the nominees before the President can officially constitute the Commission. These PPC nominees require two-thirds of the National Assembly to approve them.
