Contractors to be penalized for shoddy work

Feb 17, 2010 News

…as Jnr. Finance Minister says 2010 will see increased transparency

By Gary Eleazar

In what could arguably be yesterday’s highpoint in the 2010 budgetary debates, Junior Finance Minister Jennifer Webster last evening told the National Assembly during her presentation that Government will be moving this year to put measures in place to ensure that there is greater accountability and transparency as it relates to Public Procurement.
Webster told the National Assembly that government will be introducing a new set of bidding documents, aimed at achieving this measure.
She noted too that there will be an upgrade to the national procurement board’s website and e-bidding will be catered for.
While there was no mention of any intention to supply the names for the long awaited Public Procurement Commission she insisted that the process employed was transparent.
She declared that the government has nothing to hide and urged the opposition to work together with them.
The Minister also assured the House that contractors, as a result of some of the new measures to be put in place, will be penalized for shoddy work, as a result of some of the new measures that will be put in place.
In recent times the Government has come in for heavy criticism as it relates to the procurement of materials including drugs among other items as well as the issuance of contracts.
This had forced Head of State Bharrat Jagdeo to defend the process during the latter half of 2009 when, during a press briefing, he said that there are several agencies that Government gets funding from in the form of loans and grants, with each of the agencies having their own procurement rules that are different to that of Government.
“In some cases you have an open tender and you have a point system…the persons who get the highest points based on technical capacity and the price… they get the contract.”
He noted that in other cases it will just go to the lowest prices after that contractor would have been pre-qualified, “in another situation like with the Inter-American Development Bank you have a two-envelope system.”
Jagdeo pointed out that this system was in place in the past where, “you only open the envelope for the highest ranked bidder…so the highest ranked bidder on technical terms might have the highest bid in financial terms, but you don’t get to open the other bids.”
He said that this was the case because that bidder would have been the highest ranked, “and you have to negotiate with them.”
He explained that it was only when the negotiations fail then talks will be opened with the next ranked bidder. “Our laws say the lowest evaluated bid.” According to the president, there was a time when the engineer’s estimate was secret and “many of the people could be corrupt…if you have three bidders they have a point system where they would say the closer you get to the engineer’s estimate the highest points you get.”
As such, he explained that if one were to know what the engineer’s estimate was, then that contractor would have had an advantage over the other contractors, “many of the contractors used to bribe people to get the engineer’s estimate.”
The president however noted that to the government, the engineer’s estimate was just a guide, “everyone should know the engineer’s estimate even before the bid, “because what happens is, it is the lowest evaluated bid that we go with, “so if you know the engineer’s estimate it doesn’t matter to us…it is the lowest evaluated bid through a public competitive process that we go to.”
This nonetheless has still not laid to rest the many questions that some in the media have asked as it relates to contracts issued by Government as well as the procurement of materials many of which have been pointed out in the Auditor General’s report over the years.

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