Shoddy work on contracts…Supervising consultants must be held accountable – Govt.

May 23, 2014 News

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Complaints about poor quality State contracts have come under sharp focus with calls made by Government yesterday to make supervising consultants more accountable for shoddy work.

But the calls have raised eyebrows from the Opposition which says that the current situation drives home the urgent need for a functioning Public Procurement Commission (PPC), a constitutional body that is empowered to overlook public contracts.
The quality of work delivered on State contracts has been a sore point in recent years amidst increasing scrutiny and calls for more transparency. There have also been calls for more emphasis to ensure value for money.
It is not unknown of cases where roads crumble just a few weeks after completion. The $500M ferry stelling at Supenaam, Region Two, which suffered structural problems after a few weeks in operation, is but one glaring example of faulty works. The contractor, BK International, had claimed that designs were flawed. Remedial works were done by Government and later independent investigations blamed all the parties involved for the works, but there were no penalties.
While the focus has been on contractors, scant attention has been paid on the role of supervisors, who are mandated to ensure that the works are completed according to the Bills of Quantities; within the time frame and within costs. The supervisors are the ones who prepare the certificate of completion.
Under some conditions from overseas funding agencies, Government is bound to hire private consulting firms to supervise projects.
There have been widespread accusations of supervisors – Government-employed and private ones – taking kickbacks for turning a blind eye on faulty works.
The problem, analysts believe, has cost taxpayers billions in the last two decades.
Speaking during a procurement workshop yesterday at Grand Coastal Inn, East Coast Demerara, Finance Minister, Dr. Ashni Singh, urged that the participants consider mechanisms that will make the supervising consultancy firms more liable.
The Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) – through its local funding agency, Basic Needs Trust Fund (BNTF) is hosting the two-day workshop titled “Procurement and Management of Professional Services Workshop for Consultants”. The event is being conducted by senior CDB officials and targeting representatives of the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB) and a number of consultancy firms.

POLITICAL RESPONSIBILITY
According to the Finance Minister, it is Government that ultimately holds the political responsibility for the contracts. However, Government’s hands are tied.
“They pay for contracts when the completion certificates are signed off, which in effect says that works were executed according to the specifications.”
While contractors have clauses in their contract which stipulate the withholding of a certain percentage of the monies, retention of monies and a “Defects Liability Period”, there is very little recourse as far as consultants are concerned.
The consultants, Dr. Singh stressed, are supposed to be experts who are hired to prepare designs for civil projects and in certain cases would be responsible for supervising the execution of works. They are essentially the “ears and eyes” for the paymaster – in this case the Government.
He made it clear that “it is the supervisors who check to ensure whether the right greenheart is used or two inches of asphalt is used”.
Some of the immediate problems seen by Government include variations in the contracts. These variations are not only in the designs but also in the final costs of the projects, which in the majority of cases would rise.

While some of the design variations are unavoidable, and can include ground conditions, among other factors, the reality is that there are not any known mechanisms to penalize the consultants, the Finance Minister said.
The absence of measures makes it difficult to blacklist consultants and they are time and again allowed to make bids for other contracts.
According to Dr. Singh, in cases brought before him for problematic contracts, he has questioned whether there was a supervising consultant involved and whether anything was done about a possible dereliction of duty. He believes that mechanisms must be found to hold responsible the supervisors who “recklessly” prepare their reports that say works are completed to satisfaction, and therefore pave the way for payments to be made.
He asserted that improved systems will serve not only as a penalty but will open the doors for more bidders to participate in the competitive bidding process.

UNBELIEVABLE STATEMENTS
However, Leader of the Alliance for Change (AFC), Khemraj Ramjattan, was of the opinion that the Finance Minister’s statements were “unbelievable”.
“This particular issue of poor quality work and consultants not doing their work is nothing new. That is why we have been holding out for a PPC to be established at the earliest.”
According to Ramjattan, it is a fact that the Public Accounts Committee of the National Assembly has been discussing overpayments found by State auditors in their work at the various Government agencies.
“How can you overpay when you have a supervising engineer who checks off the work? It means that someone was not doing their work. It means that the employer…the Government has not been paying attention to how it spends the people’s monies. It means that perhaps there was corruption involved.”
The MP also made it clear that the Finance Minister and Cabinet were fully responsible for poor quality work.
“The buck stops with them. Further, you cannot now come and tell the people of Guyana after being in power for over two decades that you are now moving to put systems in place. Why was it not in place before? The Minister should be penalized just for admitting such a deficiency of the system.”

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