In this issue of the Stabroek Business we reported that one of the pursuits of the Guyana National Bureau of Standards (GNBS) is the monitoring of certain types of imports into Guyana to ensure that these are of the necessary standard and that they do not, in any way, compromise the overall purpose of their intended use. In the process of the exercise, the GNBS, it was reported, resorted in some instances, to confiscating some of the materiel and destroying it on the grounds that it was not fit and proper to be applied to the purpose for which it was acquired.
The long and short of the story here is that in a period when the construction sector is one of the busiest sectors in the country, the practice of ‘running cow,’ a phrase that speaks to engaging in what is believed to be underhand/illicit practices in pursuit of mobilizing inventory for the construction sector is – not to put too fine a point on it – full of holes.
According to the media report on the aforementioned occurrence, the GNBS inspection led to the seizure and destruction of those items that were deemed by the inspectors to be not fit for purpose. The seizure and destruction of the aforementioned articles referred to “more than 11,000 pieces of electrical fittings including wires, cables, lamp holders, circuit breakers extension cords, power outlets, switches and plugs.”
All sorts of issues arise here, including whether the country’s ongoing multi-billion dollar construction undertaking being funded by our petro dollars is not, in some respects tainted by these defective items and whether or not our ongoing and widely publicized construction undertaking is not going to leave us with ‘dodgy/vulnerable’ undertakings.
It would by no means be unsurprising if such revelations are waved off by officialdom as irritants rather than important and altogether valid observations in need of urgent attention. Indeed, it is not altogether uncommon to encounter a line of reasoning, that in circumstances where countries like ours happen upon the kinds of petro-windfalls that we have, it is to be expected that such anomalous behaviour will ‘pop up’ and even, in those circumstances, are altogether allowable.
The problem with these kinds of arguments, particularly when they pertain to countries that are customarily guilty of profligate spending, is that such deviant official behaviour is altogether predictable, even allowable under a kind of feeding trough ‘logic’ arising out of a prior condition of protracted deprivation. It is an argument which asserts that the prior protracted period of deprivation renders the outbreak of profligate and illegal behaviour altogether allowable.
The problem here of course is that in almost every instance where such situations occur, it is usually not the poorest of the poor that have priority access to the feeding trough.
As it happens, and in circumstances where the Guyana Police Force has itself been unable to successfully fend off accusations of improper behaviour resulting in unlawful gain and where, interestingly, there appears – at least for now – no official hullabaloo arising out of these ‘noises.’ government, one feels, should be keen to move with alacrity to ensure that the ‘Service and Protection’ motto under the umbrella which the GPF serves does not, going forward, become an institution that ultimately transforms into an object of derision at a time when our oil wealth shines a blinding spotlight on us as a country that is ‘going somewhere.’
