Citing the absence of parliamentary oversight or approval of government spending during 2019 and 2020, PPP/C Member of Parliament Sanjeev Datadin has tabled a motion in the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) for the Auditor General’s reports to be scrutinized individually but this move has been rejected by the Chairman of the body, Jermaine Figueira.
Datadin’s motion was tabled during the PAC’s statutory meeting on Monday and seconded by fellow PPP/C Member of Parliament and Minister of Public Works, Juan Edghill.
Datadin, in his motion which was seen by this newspaper, states that during the period, following a No Confidence Motion, there was public expenditure without parliamentary sittings.
“I hereby move a motion that the Annual Auditor General Reports for the years 2019 and 2020 be examined and scrutinized separately and sequentially by the Public Accounts Committee,” the motion states.
In an invited comment, Datadin told this newspaper that he believes the motion is integral to the work of the PAC.
He stressed that given the fact that there was no oversight and line item to correspond with spending by agencies, it is fitting that they properly scrutinize the public expenditure for the 20-month period.
However, PAC Chairman and APNU+AFC MP Figueira in a comment pointed out that the motion in its present construct will not be accepted when it is put to the committee.
“The sole aim of this motion is to rescind a motion that was put and accepted by the committee for the merging of the years 2019 & 2020 reports. An action that was done by several chairmen before this committee,” he explained. The PPP/C has a majority on the PAC.
The tabling of the motion, Figueira argued, is very clear and reinforces the opposition stance that the government is not desirous nor is it interested in scrutiny of their years, but is bent on stymieing the work of the PAC with obstructionist tactics.
“The PAC has never prevented or denied any member the opportunity to ask any amount of questions in their scrutiny of the Auditor General’s report findings so I find the reason in this motion most absurd, ridiculous and of no relevance by the learned member who is proposing this motion,” he posited.
Figueira said too that should any member of the public peruse the 2021 report findings, “then they will appreciate what we have been saying and will understand why the government is taking this obstructionist approach to prevent the PAC from doing its work with the tyranny of their one-seat majority.”
But Datadin rubbished those claims, contending that for the nation or even members of parliament to have a clear and concise understanding of the spending they must examine the years separately.
He pointed out that in the scrutiny of the combined 2017 and 2018 reports, they were able to advance the work of the PAC but unable to produce quality work. In his view, the PAC’s work on the 2016 report was of a much better quality than the work from the combined years.
“When it comes to the cross-examination for years being considered simultaneously it is very confusing. This was simply because you might be asking a question for 2017 and the officer would answer for 2018 or two members will be asking questions on different years,” he explained.
The PPP/C member further emphasised that perusing the reports has nothing to do with time but rather being able to understand the manner in which money from the public purse was spent.
The motion is set to be debated at the next PAC meeting.
A date for that meeting has not yet been announced.
