Auditor General finds… “Alarming” irregularities in $300M G/T cleanup spending

Nov 07, 2018 News

Auditor General Deodat Sharma

When it comes to the sum of $300M that was allotted in 2015 under the Ministry of Communities for the Georgetown Restoration Programme, Auditor General Deodat Sharma has found over 15 alarming financial anomalies.
In his latest report, Sharma pointed out that the Ministry of Communities expended the sum of $6.2M to purchase a Nissan double-cab pick-up. The vehicle was being used by the City Constabulary. Sharma noted, however, it was not accounted for in the permanent stores records of the Ministry and Council.
In another instance, the Auditor General pointed out that the correctness, accuracy and validity of the payment of $52.163M made by the Ministry to a contractor for 103.8% variation works on three contracts could not be verified. Also, amounts totaling $241.637M of the allotted amount ($300M) were paid over to the Council.
And that’s not all. Sharma said that Section 43 of the Fiscal Management and Accountability Act was breached, whereby the sum of $102.637M was paid over to the Council in 2016 from the 2015 Appropriations.
Further to this, the AG said that the Council utilized the amount paid over from the 2015 appropriations for expenses incurred over the period November 2015 to February 2018. Sharma said that this is an indication that the restoration grant to the Council was not utilized as intended.
He said too, “261 Payment Vouchers for expenses totaling $247.558M were submitted. This was $5.921M more than the sum ($241.637M) paid over to the Council; expenditure totaling $182.610M were not certified by the relevant officer; the City Treasurer’s approval was not evident on seven Payment Vouchers totaling $8.304M; the Finance Committee’s full approval was not evident on 21 Payment Vouchers totaling $30M; and there was no evidence of acknowledgement from payees for payments totaling $12.816M.”
Further to this, Sharma said that during his probe, the correctness, accuracy and validity of five payments totaling $4.890M could not be verified; six payments totaling $15.7M were made on six contracts that were above the $1.5M contract ceiling for the clean-up programme; payments totaling $42M could not be validated in respect of 27 contracts; and his office could not ascertain whether a transparent system was used for the awarding of contracts.
Additionally, the Auditor General said that 12 contracts totaling $21M were awarded to one contractor, contrary to the apparent stipulated maximum of four contracts to one contractor.
Sharma said that there were also instances that indicated contractors may have provided false addresses to satisfy the criterion of having to reside within the area where the work was to be done. In fact, Sharma said that applications were not seen for 25 contracts amounting to $37.500M; and the contract register was not properly written up.
Moreover, the Auditor General said that not all contracts were recorded therein. He bemoaned the fact that key information, including payments on contracts, was also not recorded by the Ministry.

All the Head of the Budget Agency said to the aforementioned was that detailed responses will be provided at a later date to the Audit Office.

Discover more from Kaieteur News

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

Latest News