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GECOM used fake quotation in $100M radio purchase
A multi-million-dollar procurement scandal at the Guyana Elections Commission
(GECOM) has taken another twist with one prominent company yesterday denying it ever submitted any quotes for a $100M radio purchase, for the May 11, 2015 national elections.
Yesterday, responding to queries about discrepancies on a quotation purportedly issued by Massy Technologies Guyana Limited, a senior official said his company never issued the quotation.
The quotation was one of three submitted by GECOM just about two weeks before the May 11, 2015 elections.
The transaction has sparked a probe by state auditors that has now widened to spending by GECOM.
The communication radio sets that were purchased by GECOM, from all indications, were outdated and came too late for them to be deployed in time for the elections. As part of the requirements, staffers would have had to be trained in the usage. Also there would not have been enough time for the equipment, along with accessories such as batteries, antennas and connections, to be installed.
According to the GECOM tender documents seen by Kaieteur News, there were three quotations- Mobile Authority, Massy Technologies and Advanced Office Systems Inc.
The one from Massy Technologies was a strange one that is bound to be red-flagged by auditors.
In the first instance, it is dated April 21, 2014– one year before GECOM went out to buy them. The quotation was valid for one month.
There were other glaring question marks. For instance, there was no signature or company stamp on the quotation.
Yesterday, a senior official of the company, who asked not to be named, said that from internal records, there was no trace of any quotations being issued to GECOM for the sale of radio equipment.
“In any case, the format used to issue quotes by Massy Technologies is far different from what you have sent to us for verification. More importantly, we would definitely not submit a quote for a radio that has been discontinued by the manufacturer.”
GECOM reportedly asked for Barrett radios, which are manufactured by an Australian-owned company. The local authorised dealer for Barrett is Advanced Office Systems Inc., one of the companies that tendered but was ignored.
GECOM’s Chief Elections Officer, Keith Lowenfield, on April 23, 2015, wrote the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB) making a case for the radio purchases.
He said that the radios were urgently needed to help GECOM communicate with its staffers who are working in outlying areas that had no telephone services.
It appeared that NPTAB, as the body overseeing state contracts, did not pay attention at all to the three quotes submitted by Lowenfield.
The documents were sent also to the Cabinet of Ministers, under former President Donald Ramotar, where the fake Massy quote went unnoticed. The Cabinet granted its “No Objection” to contract and it was later awarded to Mobile Authority.
Mobile Authority is the same business that received at least $290M in contracts last year from GECOM in highly questionable circumstances.
According to Government figures, the Brasse brothers were awarded at least 40 percent of the total contracts paid out by GECOM last year.
There also appears to be evidence that GECOM conducted contract-splitting to hide a number of questionable purchases from the Cabinet.
Among some of the purchases were pliers, Duracell batteries, toners and even office equipment.
In almost all the cases, there was evidence that the prices were highly inflated, as in the case of the radios.
Some of radios supplied by Brasse are retailing for $300,000. Yet GECOM paid on average $2M apiece.
On that fake Massy Technology quote that GECOM submitted to NPTAB, one of those $300,000 radios was said to have cost $2.25M each.
Lowenfield had distanced himself from the purchases saying that NPTAB is the one that made the final decision.
GECOM’s Chairman, Dr. Steve Surujbally, who is set to retire this year, said that it was the Secretariat that handled purchasing of items and services.
The Opposition members of the Commission also distanced themselves saying they can’t recall seeing any proposals for those questionable purchases.
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