Motion to compel attendance

Dec 09, 2023 Editorial

Kaieteur News – The good news is that a motion is being prepared to compel the attendance of public officers before the Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC). Summoning and compelling attendance is a solid beginning, if only to convey to public officers across Guyana that the handling of taxpayers’ money is a serious business, one demanding the highest levels of care. It is our view that more should follow, in that in clear cases of egregious malfeasances, or unpardonable negligence, the Guyana Police Force should be engaged, and the proven corrupt made to pay for their misdeeds. We have to think of going beyond testimony and words, making notes in the record, waiting for the next round of PAC engagements, and then repeating the old, tired cycle.

Public officers in all of the regions must provide answers, be held accountable. Honest mistakes may be looked upon benignly, but tampering with the millions belonging to the people must be dealt with harshly. Some public officers have become so much a part of a lax accountability culture (or a politically protective one) that they have taken matters to a new depth in recent times. They thumb their noses at invitations from the PAC to turn up to committee meetings, and give an account for how taxpayers’ money was spent, and why things are how and where they are. As examples, the completeness and credibility of recordkeeping, and the adherence to standing policies and procedures, as well as the substance of what is shared at arm’s length with the PAC.

The record of the past is not heartening, as there has been what gives every appearance of a play in progress, with everyone reading their lines, sticking to their set positions in the PAC meetings, when they do take place. This is usually followed by self-congratulation on the part of public officers on making it unscathed through another callup, and some satisfaction in the PAC that it has done its duty. The question for the PAC is duty done by whom? Clocking in for the routines of tepid and innocuous question and answer gatherings may satisfy PAC obligations. But such actions do nothing for probing to the greatest extent possible into the schemes, the manipulations, and the wrongdoings of public officers who rip-off the public coffers on a continual basis.

It could be argued that there are benefits in face-to-face interviews, interrogations of audit reports, and monitoring for clean management of public funds by accounting officers. But when there are only the equivalents of verbal slaps on the wrist in the face of costly wrongdoing, then that represents nothing more than the PAC going through the motions. Members are marked present, and it is back to the usual business of how to circumvent the rules, with the same expensive fallouts. Worse still, when public officers make themselves disappear, or simply refuse to respond to PAC calls, then the injustices meted out against Guyanese taxpayers mount. In essence, whether public officers appear and give a poor account of themselves, or they outright ignore PAC invitations to do so, there is no urgency, and nothing to compel them to that state.

Appearing and providing answers to the PAC have to be mandatory, the committee given more reach and teeth. It has the force of parliament behind it, and that should count for something. Unsaid at this point are what the next steps should be. PAC meetings and probing to get to the bottom of how millions were spent should not be reduced to the farce of a wink and a nod. Or don’t worry, everything is all taken care of, as attending and explaining are merely part of the protocols, and nothing of a more piercing or punishing nature.

Unless public officers at every level are forced to recognize and deal with new standards of scrutiny and possible sanctions, then nothing will change. There will be more of the regular pontificating and lamenting from the PAC, with its limitations visible before citizens. There is sure to be more of the same going around in circles, and millions on millions of public monies draining away annually, and dishonest public officers having a good laugh. The PAC must be armed.

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attendance, Editorial, Guyana Police Force, Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC), taxpayers

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