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Govt. continues to overpay contractors
The construction of duplex living quarters at Mongrippa Hill, Bartica which was cited by auditors.
State auditors have raised concerns about the instances where Government has overpaid on several construction projects.
This has been picked up by the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) who highlighted the growing trend where auditors found 126 instances when contractors were overpaid in 2016. According to the PPP, in 2014, there were 53 such instances and in 2015, 62 cases of overpayments to contractors.
The Auditor General’s report of 2016 has repeatedly recommended that accounting officers ensure that projects are completed before payments are made.
This week, the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of Parliament reviewed the auditor’s findings for Region Seven (Cuyuni-Mazaruni). Regional Executive Officer (REO), Roderick Edinboro and team were grilled on many findings.
Auditors found that regional officials had overpaid on the maintenance of sections of the Kalcuni Road, Bartica of $686,000. They also cited the construction of duplex living quarters at Mongrippa Hill, Bartica where the contractor was overpaid $1.7M.
“The Audit Office recommend that the Regional Administration ensure all works are executed in accordance with the contract document and in keeping with the timeline of the projects before payment is made,” the Auditor General’s report highlighted.
As far as the PPP is concerned, these and other instances are additional reasons for Opposition Leader, Bharrat Jagdeo, to sit out an anti-corruption march planned for Friday by the State Assets Recovery Agency (SARA).
In a letter to SARA head, Professor Clive Thomas, PPP Chief Whip, Gail Teixeira said the Opposition holds firmly to the position that the A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) Government can easily be classified as the most corrupt Government in the post-independent English speaking Caribbean.
In three short years, the PPP stated that the government has managed to completely by-pass the public procurement process, mandated by law, and has handed to its cronies and financiers, hundreds of contracts to the value of billions of dollars.
“The number of cases of such violations is mounting on a daily basis. Suffice herein to provide a few most notable ones thus far which have cost the Guyanese people billions of dollars to their detriment,” the PPP stated.
The walk has been described by the PPP as a mere “smoke screen” to detract from the grossest violations of the constitutional and statutory provisions regarding financial probity, transparency and accountability ever witnessed since independence.
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