Getting answers from the Government is like pulling teeth

Aug 01, 2010 Features / Columnists, My Column

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By Adam Harris

I could not help but notice the anger from some government officials when they were questioned about certain projects designed to enhance national life. For example, Kaieteur News happened upon a situation involving two top-of-the-line motor cars—both of them Jaguars.
The reporter happened to be around when Customs recognized that something was wrong with the Customs declaration involving these cars. The importer recorded the capacity of the vehicles at the maximum allowed by Customs for concessionary tariff. But some shrewd officer recognised the dishonesty and decided to ‘pull in’ the vehicles.
As a good reporter, the scoop was there so the news was duly published. This invoked the anger of Commissioner General Khurshid Sattaur, who was not only abusive and foul mouthed when asked for a comment, but who also later said that he spoke off the record. If a man calls me about something and I cuss him out I cannot claim that I was doing so off the record when in the first instance I did not even deign to listen to the reporter.
The same thing happened when Kaieteur News decided to examine the award of a contract to Makeshwar Fip Motilall. This contract was for the construction of a road leading to Amaila Falls. As investigations revealed, this man was not qualified for the contract. He had never built a road, did not have the equipment, and certainly did not have the qualified staff to undertake the project.
Finance Minister Dr Ashni Singh and Head of the Privatisation Unit, Winston Brassington, called a press conference and attacked the newspaper for attempting to sabotage a project that was for the national good. The paper, understandably, said “Nonsense” and continued to examine the potential of the contractor to undertake the project.
Time has proven the newspaper right. The project, just as the newspaper feared, is still to get underway. Questions about this failure meet with an angry silence and even more accusations. In fact, things have reached the stage where every article response to the Kaieteur News is greeted by some accusation that is extraneous to the news at hand. It is as if the campaign is to attack the newspaper at every turn.
In response to one query, a reporter was told that his newspaper company could have put in a bid. I am not sure that newspapers are into the business of bidding for contracts to build roads and bridges and sea defence.
Just a few days ago, diligent research unearthed an memorandum of understanding signed by Prime Minister Samuel Hinds who holds responsibility for energy, Ronald Alli, who was the then Chairman of Guyana Power and Light, and Makeshwar Fip Motilall on behalf of Synergy Holdings Inc. The date of the signing was May 23, 2006.
In that memorandum, Motilall promised many things, one of them being that the government grants Synergy Holdings Inc., the continued rights to develop the Amaila Falls Hydroelectric Project. Motilall committed himself to secure firm financing for the hydro project by March 1, 2007.
He also undertook to start construction of the project on August 1, 2007 and commission the project on August 1, 2010. Today must be a significant day because Guyana should have begun receiving hydropower.
More than that, Motilall undertook to have commercial generation from the Amaila Falls project by December 15 this year. We know that nothing happened. However, the government remained silent as though there was no such project in the works.
Whenever reporters asked related questions they were greeted with abuse and insults from certain people. At one stage the authorities threatened people who talked about the project and gave answers. The result was that no one wants to speak. They are afraid and the society is therefore left in the dark about so many things.
Mr Brassington actually said to me that Government does not conduct its business by talking to the press as things are developing. He said that information is passed when things are complete. If that is the case then the public would have to wait a very long time for any information on the hydro project although the government and by extension, the people, has already advanced US$1.6 million to Motilall—taxpayers’ money that could so many things.
Motilall, in the memorandum of understanding stated, “Nothing in this MOU prohibits the disclosure of any confidential information if such disclosure is required by…any governmental or regulatory agency…” Whether any of these agencies sought answers for the failure of Motilall to execute this memorandum remains a state secret.
Suffice it to say that Motilall was duly given another contract. This must be an insult to the taxpayers.
The non-release of information is causing all the problems. Brassington would say that he is not prepared to comment; the Finance Minister would ask for time and that time becomes endless; others simply tell reporters that “it is none of their business.”
When will work begin on the hydro road? The project is already delayed. When will Motilall disclose the people he has on his payroll to undertake the project? When will the first shipment of heavy equipment arrive?
Word is that Motilall chartered a barge and unless it sank in the Atlantic, it should have been here, but there is no one to provide answers.
We do not know what happened to the memorandum signed in 2006 and how much money went into whatever was planned.
There is no Freedom of Information Act although President Jagdeo promised one a year ago. One cannot get answers and members of the public, being what they are, can only sit back and hope that the newspapers get answers.
And for their part, if the newspapers dig too deep, they get a law suit that is designed to shut them up. Kaieteur News has had many of these.

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