Belle View project- how the PPP Govt does business

Feb 12, 2025 Editorial, News

Editorial…

Kaieteur News- The $865M Belle View Pump Station contract award is just one example of the way that the PPPC Government and its specially chosen people do the nation’s business. The award was controversial, with glaring deficiencies relative to the winner, the Tepui Group, Inc, meeting some of the criteria for the project.

Despite some requirements not being met, the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB) turned a blind eye, and gave the contract to a group that could hardly be said to know how to fulfill it. The progress reports to date confirm that NPTAB’s decision further agitates Guyanese taxpayers, with more failures looking highly probable in days to come.

From all indications, the Tepui Group has not convinced citizens that it has the skills to get this pump station project done. On the other hand, it certainly has extraordinary skills at lifting millions from Guyana’s coffers. The Tepui Group has collected $182M so far, or slightly more than 21% of the total $865M project cost, but has only done 10% of work. This was what had to be squeezed out of Minister of Agriculture, Zulfikar Mustafa during the examination of the Estimates for his ministry in parliament last week. “The contractor was paid $182M…and it’s already about 10% of the work completed there”., according to the Agriculture Minister. “About 10%” could mean anything, including what is closer to below 5%.

We appreciate that the completion date for the Belle View project still has another five to seven months to go. What is not so encouraging is that the contract was awarded on August 14, 2023, and a year and a half later, only “about 10%” of the work has been done, which came from the minister’s own mouth. Either the calendar, the mathematics, or the logic is suffering from an extended bout of the anemic. This is not good for a project award that was questionable and raised all manner of concerns from the start. We reason this as follows: if “about 10%” is where the project is after 18 months of the Tepui Group receiving the award (and close to $200M), then July or August of this year as the completion date looks as remote as the planets.

How much can the Tepui Group get done between now and August? If 10% in 18 months, what percentage in the remaining five to six months, as per the contract terms? This already has that peculiar smell associated with many other contracts awarded by the PPPC Government’s procurement and tender machinery. We at this publication will make this bold predication from now, early in February: it is doubtful that the Tepui Group can deliver by the due date. It doesn’t have the depth nor the track record nor the people to position it for this home stretch. The clock is ticking on the Tepui Group and the PPPC Government. Perhaps both sets of Guyanese will find shelter in the traditional May-June rainy season, which is an excuse that has been used so often before, that it doesn’t get much traction. It just appears that the stage is already set for one of those old six-for-nine PPPC Government contract awards that will cost Guyanese taxpayers in many ways. Extra time needed is usually the first. Extra money goes hand-in-glove with that trick. Guyanese should brace for one more extra: the extraordinary efforts from Vice President Jagdeo to distance from these question marks hanging over the head of his government, while pretending at ignorance of NPTAB’s true modus operandi. Most of the people there are his own, so he should know.

For clarity, we have no issue with a stranger to Guyana’s world of procurement and contracts. Where we have a problem is with the strangeness of awarding $865M of Guyana’s money to a group that lacked requirements in such vital areas. It was almost foregone that the Tepui Group is not in a position to give the people in the Belle View and wider neighborhood the pump station that is so badly needed. The only issue left for us is how many more millions will be advanced to the Tepui Group, and who else gets to share in the wasted millions.

(Belle View project- how the PPP Govt does business)

Belle View project, Inc., National Procurement and Tender Administration Board, PPPC Government, Pump Station contract, Tepui Group

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Belle View project- how the PPP Govt does business

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