Such arrogance from a nice young man

Aug 23, 2009 Features / Columnists, My Column

By Adam Harris

This week I had planned to be light and to make people realize that there is a life away from the criminal scenes that give people nightmares. There was a time when people heard an explosion they knew that it was a vehicle backfiring and paid little attention.
These days the slightest sound out of the ordinary would send people to windows or to the floor. The psyche of the people living along coastal Guyana has changed.
Some people are blaming the government and some are blaming the police force. I blame the education system but I have been doing this for so long that I have become public enemy among some people who administer the system.
Three weeks ago I managed to get Education Minister Shaik Baksh on the phone and I wrangled an interview. I got a promise, but after that I could neither get Minister Baksh nor the interview.
I recall being cussed out by the Minister for a comment I made over the system. I was critical of people not being able to read although they had what passes for degrees; I was critical of teachers who were not much better and I was critical of the apparent lack of interest by the administration.
I then started to look at other aspects of national life and suddenly I discovered that the government is extremely defensive. I am supposed to be taking a rest but given the advances in technology, I happened to notice a response to an article this paper did on August 20, last.
Just before I proceeded on leave a young man called me to show me the cost of a pump that ended up costing the government and taxpayers three or four times more than it should. The engineer’s estimate was high to begin with and it suggested that the engineer did not even source the pump. This is criminal. All he did was put down a figure that came to his head.
The contractor who tendered, somehow or the other matched those figures and won the bid. All this is good because I now know that the contractor made a killing—sorry—a fortune. This, without turning a screw or raising a spade.
I know this because in the same way the young man was able to acquire the cost of the pump the contractor would have done that. He would have then imported it and since it was for a government project he would not have paid any taxes.
Lo and behold, the Finance Minister, a young man who was extremely bright at school, who secured a Guyana Scholarship, told GINA a most remarkable thing.
“Indeed, if the author or editor of Kaieteur News is able to access these items at such low cost and to execute works at costs significantly lower than are currently being paid, the Ministry would urge that they participate in future tenders by submitting a bid and competing for the award of the contract themselves.”
That is utter disrespect for the people of this country, Ashni. The people at Kaieteur News might not have the skill to undertake the project so they cannot bid. They will not have the machinery, which is a serious consideration in any tender.
But such is the arrogance. The money is of no concern to the administration, it would seem. Why was there no attempt to investigate the engineer for overpricing the pump? That should have been a major concern to the Finance Minister instead of him directing his concern to what he calls “misleading assertions being made in some sections of the media about the prices paid by certain Government agencies for works done or goods supplied.”
I know that Kaieteur News managed to procure the quotation from the supplier so the information could not be misleading.
In any other country there would have been an investigation as was the case of Basdeo Panday and the airport project; or with the United States and its contracts in Iraq. Perhaps the arrogance stems from the fact that the government is in charge and whatever it does is right, especially since there seems to be no political party in sight to rival it in the near future.
I know that if people believe that money is wasted and there is corruption then the extent of thievery will increase. Imagine some policemen seized some money from a person believed to be implicated in an abduction and robbery and had the nerve to take a sizeable portion of the evidence. They believe that their actions are fair given the nature of things.
The Finance Minister is someone to whom I am close and while he may see it as his duty to come to the rescue of his government he should let his knowledge of things financial rule his actions and his comments.
But then again, I am only a voice in the wind.

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