No evidence of disciplinary action against Engineers over major Govt. projects

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No evidence of disciplinary action against Engineers over major Govt. projects – AG Report

Oct 21, 2016 News

The Auditor General’s Report for the fiscal year 2015 has stated that there is a continuing trend of there not

Auditor General,
Deodat Sharma

being evidence of engineers and staff of government agencies being disciplined for their corrupt involvement in the assessment of works and the certification of progress payments for a number of major government projects.
Auditor General, Deodat Sharma, said that he had reported previously in his 2014 audit that overpayments are a serious challenge. It was still found to be an issue in his 2015 report.
The State Auditor noted the lack of disciplinary actions to the many instances of overpayments which have rolled over from the 2014 audit into the 2015 report. He said that the lack of this evidence hints at Management’s perceived inaction or inability to remedy the current situation.
Within the report, Sharma said that recoveries of overpayment on contracts for periods prior to 2015 were minimal. He said that the value of overpayments on contracts increased to $35.7M in 2015 as compared to $31.315M in 2014.
Also, the audit reported that recoveries amounted to $30.517M of the sum of $407.512M overpaid on contracts that were awarded prior to 2015. The report said, “Whilst some entities had made progress in recovering overpayments, others faced serious challenges.”
The report said that overpayments amounting to $35.7M were made on measured works on 31 contracts administered by Ministries, Departments and Regions in 2015.
Specifically, overpayments were recorded for the Synthetic Track at Leonora; West Coast Demerara whereby contractors were overpaid $4.767M for Phase three Lot six which entailed the installation of Water Distribution Line and System; and $4.114M was overpaid for Phase three Lot five which dealt with the Night Lighting System.
The audit noted that there were overpayments on other projects including works on the construction of Kitchen Mess Hall Building at Air Corps, Timehri; landfilling and concrete works at Student Dorms, Liliendaal; and upgrading of the Aishalton Secondary Male and Female Dorms in Region Nine.
Additionally, over $300M was recorded as unrecovered overpayments for the East Coast Demerara Highway improvement project. A total of $1.610B was budgeted to complete all the road works which began in 2011.
A total of $622.161M had been expended as at December 2014. The project had been split into several lots and awarded separately. However, overpayments were recorded in lots three and four.
For Lot three, the area between the villages La Bonne Intention and Beterverwagting, the report said that the contractor, Courtney Benn Contracting Services received advanced payments totalling $278.346M. However, the work done was valued at $157.663M, hence the company received in excess of $120.683M.
In the case of Lot four – Beterverwagting to Triumph, at the time of reporting, the completed works was valued at $76.954M. The total payments made to the company amounted to $209.603M. Thus, the overpayment totalled $132.649M.

1 thoughts on “No evidence of disciplinary action against Engineers over major Govt. projects – AG Report”

rs dasai October 21, 2016 at 1:28 pm

Over payments on fixed price contracts? NO wonder that ‘The Cabinet’ is worried about the low MATH scores. What are the penalties for such failures?