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Sep 06, 2009 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

If and when the Auditor General conducts an investigation and a value–for–money audit into the Stanleytown Pump Station, he will have an opportunity to determine just what
price was paid for the pump that was installed and whether an identical or similar pump could not be had for far less, without any decrease in performance.
There are serious concerns as to the award of this tender for this particular project. Even if there was a single bidder, it was the duty of those who evaluated the bid, as well as those who normally review this process, to ensure that they got value–for–money.
The American government, I am sure would be willing to assist the Audit Office into determining whether the pump was overpriced. But of course we do not need to go that far. Any school child provided with the name and model and horsepower of the pump can search via “Google” and come with comparable prices for the pump in question.
It is also hoped that the Auditor General will not restrict himself to just the price of the pump and the installation but will also consider the cost of painting the pump station.
The Auditor General must understand that despite his office enjoying independence by virtue of its constitutional status, he has an obligation to the public to pronounce on these matters since it is public funds that are involved and his office is a custodian of the public’s trust.
The Kaieteur News continues to bring to the attention of the public a number of concerns about the use of public funds. This is a most valuable service to Guyanese and well within the legitimate duties of a newspaper.
Just yesterday, it featured a building built under an initiative that was supposed to give young people the opportunity to empower themselves. At the time that initiative was launched this column had been critical of the proposed projects since it is very easy to ask young people to come up with ideas about what they want, but it is quite a different matter to go ahead and build these things.
Many of the young people wanted computer labs and community centres, and in giving these young people the opportunity to implement some of their ideas sufficient attention needed to be paid to sustainability. When it comes to sustainability, it is important not only that there be needs and ability to sustain financing, but also the requisite institutional capacity for managing these things.
After many of those projects came under criticisms in another section of the press there was an understandable plea for these projects to be given more time. Perhaps, now that this newspaper has featured the underuse of one such building constructed under that initiative, it is time that a full review of the entire initiative is undertaken so that the number of white elephants can be quantified.
Hundreds of millions were spent on that initiative and surely there must be public interest into what benefits were derived from such massive expenditure.
The same funds could have been spent to ensure greater use of existing facilities and to develop some management structures for community centres. Today too many of our community centres are underutilized, too many of our school buildings are being used for church services on weekends and too little on sporting and cultural pursuits for our young people.
Young people need mentors; they need people to guide them. Those efforts must be supported. The idea to simply build things and hope that the young people would make use of them may have been well-intentioned, but not everything that is well-intentioned is viable and hopefully this is one of the lessons that will emerge out of a review of those projects.
In every community, areas should be set aside for recreational development. However, simply building a facility does not guarantee that it will be utilized. Mechanisms have to be put in place to ensure community ownership, participation and management. It is the failure to animate such mechanism that has today led to a situation where many community centres and projects constructed with taxpayers’ funds are becoming white elephants.
All, however, is not lost. Rather than smarting under criticisms, the government should acknowledge that mistakes were made, that it was too ambitious a scheme to hand over these things to the youth without adult mentorship and guidance, and a fresh start should be made to ensure that the greater use is made of these facilities so as to justify the hundreds of millions of dollars which are being allowed to go into disrepair.

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