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PAC makes headway in quest for Procurement Commission
A matter which has been on the agenda of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) is finally seeing some sort of progress, as the body has started the deliberations on the nominees for the Public Procurement Commission (PPC).
Carl Greenidge
The PPC has attracted much attention over the past few months as members of the Opposition, particularly the Alliance for Change (AFC), expressed that they wanted the Commission to be established before lending support to the Anti Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism Bill.
The Auditor General’s 2012 report has also urged the Ministry of Finance to comply with the law and establish the Public Procurement Commission.
Discussions were stalled for sometime as the People’s Progressive Party/Civic, to date, has not submitted its nominees.
On Monday last, members of the PAC decided that it was time to move forward. At the meeting, they discussed the criteria and process of assessing applicants for senior posts in the Audit Department and the Public Procurement Commission.
According to the PAC’s Chairman, Carl Greenidge, the Presidential Advisor on Empowerment, Odinga Lumumba, attempted to continue the suspension of discussions on the PPC. A call was then made by Trevor Williams of the AFC, to simply vote on the names received by the Committee thus far.
Members of the Opposition coalition, A Partnership For National Unity (APNU) , also supported the call to move forward.
APNU’s Volda Lawrence, who is the former Chairperson of that committee, later suggested that the Chairman be asked to undertake discussions with the three political parties in order to resolve the issue.
While Greenidge agreed with the call for a resolution, he did not accept Lumumba’s suggestion for Government to introduce Cabinet’s no-objection clause.
Greenidge then reminded members in attendance of Article 212 of the Constitution which is clear about the structure of the Public Procurement Commission and made no provision for the “kind of Cabinet veto Lumumba sought on behalf of the PPP.”
Greenidge said, “The matter would be best dealt with at the Plenary of the House.” He also recommended that the meeting be focused on the specific tasks it had been assigned.
Odinga Lumumba
The committee then agreed to discuss the process by which the nominees would be selected and the selection criteria weighed, whether or not the People’s Progressive Party/Civic submitted its list of nominees, and leave for the moment the actual list of names.
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