The government must account for our money

Apr 22, 2012 Features / Columnists, My Column

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The change in the composition of Parliament has resulted in a new dispensation when it comes to spending taxpayers’ money. For one, the government must be prepared to explain these expenditures when the opposition believes that they are exorbitant.
This current sitting of the National Assembly brought this forcibly home. For example, the Alliance For Change saw some things that appeared to be outside the ordinary. One of these things was the number of contract workers in the public service.
There was a time when employment in the public service was strictly by application and confirmation by the Public Service Commission. Once employed, people were expected to serve their thirty-three and one-third years in order to qualify for a pension and gratuity. Life was pretty straightforward.
However, in recent times, the government employed people outside the Public Service Commission at rates that were higher than what the average public servant earned. This bred discontent in the heart of those who were not contract employees.
The government justified this by saying that the contract employee was short term and therefore would get his pension and gratuity during his tenure. But the opposition, like the traditional public servants, noticed that the people who got these contracts were more or less people close to the government. The upshot was that the opposition decided that contract employees were those people who were being paid for their services.
The Alliance For Change decided to challenge this practice and voted to cut contract employment. The government retaliated that this was an attack against the labour force. It is now known that the Alliance For Change failed to get contract employment out of the system. Its partner in the opposition did not vote to support it.
This vote made me realize a few things. For one, the government had to cut deals and President Donald Ramotar was not opposed to cutting deals. And the world of politics is about deals. All over the world the ruling party seeks accommodation with members of the opposition.
However, the public has a lot that it expects to happen and no number of deals can change the way the public feels. There has been a lot of money spent on services during the past few years. The most recent was the hydroclave system installed in the compound of the Georgetown Public Hospital. In the past, the press accepted the figures presented and that was that.
However, there is a new dispensation, one that has some reporters scared and at the same time, has officials wondering at exposures that may not be above board. All of a sudden they are not comfortable because sections of the media now have them under the microscope.
When the hydroclave was commissioned the authorities presented a figure. The other sections of the media took those figures and ran with them because that was how the reporters in Guyana behave these days.
The society began to ask for investigative reporting and but for the resilience of a newspaper owner, Glenn Lall, this might have remained a pipe dream. He listened to his reporters and opted to take the chance that they may make mistakes and in the event of legal action, put his money up for any defence. It was that support that led to the disclosures now emanating from the hydroclave installation.
One explanation for an unusually high cost is now being attributed to a slip of the tongue. Chief Executive Officer of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation, Michael Khan, had told a reporter that the shed that houses the hydroclave system was erected at a cost of $60 million. Contractors looked at the construction and said, “No way.”
Someone in authority must have questioned Mr. Khan, because he issued a statement that put the cost of the shed at $21 million. He then continued that when he said $60 million he had $16 million in his head.
I wondered how a chief executive would call a figure of $60 million when he meant $16 million. If someone were to ask me the cost of my house by no stretch of imagination would I say $40 million when I have $7 million in my head. From the time I utter the figure I would know that I am talking something so out of the way that even me would not believe it.
We are now at the stage where the people who authorized the hydroclave must open up to the people of Guyana. They want many things, not least being better wages and salaries. One official has promised to explain all that went into the hydroclave.
But this is only one case. There are so many and the public is looking to the press for answers. When the government opted to award a contract to ‘Fip’ Motilall for the construction of the road leading to the Amaila Falls, immediately Kaieteur News knew that this was not above board. The newspaper checked Motilall’s credentials and literally begged the government to not proceed down that road. The government was arrogant.
It talked about people destroying Motilall’s character and about the newspaper simply attacking the project for the sake of attack. In some countries the people behind the award of the contract would have been sent packing. Not Guyana.
The road is costing so much more than it should and this would have not been the case had the government simply heeded the findings of Kaieteur News.
There are other expenditures being undertaken and the press, with the new dispensation, is looking at these. That is why I am not happy that the government is providing a subvention to the state media. These are operating in the same environment as the private media. There is no subvention for the private media.
If the state media were not seeking advertisements I would not have minded the subvention. Instead, the government is giving it money to counter the exposures by the private media and to pull the wool over people’s eyes. This cannot be fair.
Will the parliamentary opposition allow these subventions to pass? I hate to believe that this will be the case. Meanwhile, no one is paying the private media to protect the man in the street—the people of Guyana.
This is where we expect the new parliamentary dispensation to mean something.

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