Govt. pussyfooting on correcting repeated skullduggery committed at State agencies

Apr 13, 2023 News

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…PAC Chair says behaviour shows scant regard for rule of law

Kaieteur News – The Government is once again being accused of dragging its feet on implementing measures to correct the repeated skullduggery perpetrated at the level of State agencies as highlighted by the Auditor General (AG)’s reports.

This is owing to its failure to adhere to the parliamentary standing orders which stipulates that recommendations to help address those irregularities are to be made via a treasury memorandum which laid in the parliament by the Minister of Finance.

The Treasury Memorandum contains recommendations to provide guidance to accounting officers to address the repeated financial and managerial anomalies that were identified by the Auditor General.

Parliamentary Standing Order 82 (3) specifies that within 90 days of the presentation of a report from the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), the Government shall table its Treasury Memorandum with the recommendations.

However, it has been 117 days since the adoption of the report and the Government is yet to table its Treasury Memorandum for that report.

In an invited comment, Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) Jermaine Figueira lamented on Government’s failure to implement the Treasury Memorandum.

He said that Government’s failure to adhere to the standing orders shows its scant regard for the rule of law.

Figueira noted that “apart from the firing of lots of the accounting officers that served in the last government, we see similar occurrences of mal practices reported by the AG’s recent reports, but we are unable to point to what the government is doing or its advice to present accounting officers.”

The PAC Chair stressed that this is not how the government should treat with issues that could reduce wasteful and irregular expenditure.

He noted, “The Treasury Memorandum is usually guidance given to accounting officers to address financial and managerial anomalies that were identified in the AG’s Report of the expenditure of government’s finances. This, when laid in Parliament, gives the country and MP a gage as to how seriously the government treats with issues that could reduce wasteful and irregular expenditure.”

Just weeks ago, A Partnership for National Unity +Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) Member of Parliament, Ganesh Mahipaul called out the government for flouting the parliamentary Standing Orders to help address the irregularities highlighted by the Auditor General’s report.

In a statement issued to the press, Mahipaul disclosed that the issue dates back to recommendations made for the 2016 Auditor General Report. He explained that the PAC has presented, debated, and adopted a report on the audited public accounts of Guyana up to the year 2016.

He said the government has since failed to follow through with the process to table the treasury memorandum that is necessary to help correct the wrongdoings committed at the level of State agencies.

“In the 2016 report, there were a number of overpayments to contractors. Our recommendation is that the accounting officers must pay for measured work and those responsible should be met with various sanctions…” the MP said adding that because the recommendations were not tabled in the form of the treasury memorandum, there is no formal directive for the government agencies and ministries to follow to correct these errors.

“That’s why you find the issues that were raised by the auditor general report since 2016 are not being properly addressed and the issues keeps reoccurring and coming back again in the 2017, 2018 and 2019 reports even coming up to the 2022 report.”

As a result of this failure, Mahipaul believes that the Minister with the Responsibility of Finance, Dr. Ashni Singh is in breach of the regulations as required by Standing Order 82 (3).

According to Mahipaul, the Minister of Finance can be held in contempt due to this blatant disregard of the parliamentary principles and breach of the code of conduct.

Further, Mahipaul stated that by failing to take the necessary action on the recommendations contained in the PAC report, the entire Government is in breach of fulfilling its responsibilities and obligations to the people of Guyana.

He said the PAC report contains several recommendations aimed at improving the guardrails of democracy and enhancing transparency and accountability in Guyana.

He stressed that the Government’s inaction on these recommendations indicates a disregard for the principles of good governance.

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• agencies, Auditor General, Government, skullduggery, State

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