‘Govt, must come clean on GPL contract’

Aug 04, 2025 News

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…Mahipaul says Prime Minister had told Parliament contract was awarded to Method4 company, but cabinet cleared contract for IEG

Kaieteur News – Government is coming under further scrutiny over the controversial consultancy contract which Cabinet gave its no-objection to for a Dominican Republic company to supervise infrastructure upgrades to the Guyana Power and Light (GPL) transmission lines for the Wales Gas to Energy Plant.

Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo on Thursday last defended the monthly cost of US$650,000 being charged by a Dominican Republic Company -Inter Energy Group (IEG) to provide management supervision for GPL Inc., although he said that no deal has been reached as yet with the company. However, former Member of Parliament, Ganesh Mahipaul said Prime Minister Mark Phillips had told the National Assembly of another company that was granted the contract. As such Mahipaul is calling on the administration to come clean on the matter, saying this issue has exposed the government’s contradictions and corruption. According to bidding documents seen by this newspaper, IEG did not feature as one of several companies that had responded to a GPL tender for the works.

Kaieteur News reported last week that government approved the sole-sourced contract for US$650,000 per month to IEG. Cabinet gave its no-objections to the contract at its meeting on July 7, 2025, according to documents seen by this newspaper. According to the Cabinet paper titled:’ Contract for the provision of consultancy services Guyana Power and Light Inc.’ cabinet reviewed a memorandum presented by Finance Minister, Dr. Ashni Singh and granted its no-objection.

Jagdeo last week said the US$650,000 figure is a small amount. He explained that the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed with the company since early last year and it was for the supervision of infrastructure the Guyana Power and Light (GPL) needs. “You want when you build something, a tower, like those towers you want to build them to international standards. You can’t get the GPL staff to supervise it. They don’t have time, they were busy trying to keep the power on and fixing the old system, you know, some of the transformers that are going out. So, you have to get a firm to supervise and often a firm to supervise project they come between 5% of the contract price to 5 – 8% of the contract price,” the VP explained.

The company is well known and has great technical abilities and looking at this supervision cost compared to the scope of the civil work contract it is small. “…it was not secretly done, you can’t secretly hire somebody as Mahipaul has been pushing. Mahipaul has been trying hard to talk they are trying to resurrect this whole thing about corruption. Imagine that coming from Mahipaul,” he stressed.

Jagdeo then went on to clarify that no agreement has been signed as negotiations are still ongoing. He disclosed that, “There is a proposal that went to cabinet that spoke of this but we now need to see that they’re actually delivering on what is in the proposal. When a company makes an offer, you get you look at it, compare it with others, but then you have to discuss and concretise in clear legal language what this is, and that negotiation is still ongoing, and I’m not even sure it will be concluded before the elections.” The VP assured the media that when the agreement is signed it will be made public but if negations break down then they will have to return to the drawing table, however it is the hope that this does not occur.

Different contractor

However, in his statement on Sunday, Mahipaul reminded that on Friday, May 23, 2025, during the 104th Sitting of the 12th Parliament, Prime Minister Phillips addressed the National Assembly on the matter of the $28.7 billion allocation under the line-item Power Generation (Gas-to-Energy Project). The Prime Minister clearly stated that this sum is designated for enhancing the transmission and distribution system and that three contracts were awarded to Power China and Kalpataru for works across Regions 4, 5, and 6, Mahipaul said.

Mahipaul said Phillips further informed the House that these contracts were signed on April 4, 2025. When questioned by former MP Volda Lawrence regarding the consultancy services for the project, the Prime Minister responded with unambiguous clarity: “the consultancy contract was awarded to Method4, a Canadian company, to the tune of US$7 million,” Mahipaul recalled.

Mahipaul said Jagdeo is now vigorously defending InterEnergy Group, a completely different entity, as the consultancy firm on the same transmission and distribution project. “This contradiction strikes at the very heart of truth and transparency. So, we ask the question every Guyanese citizen deserves answered: Who is lying? Jagdeo or Phillips?” Mahipaul questioned.

He further asked what happened to Method4; where did InterEnergy Group come from; were two consultancy contracts awarded for the same work or is one story the truth and the other a carefully concocted deception?

Mahipaul who is vice presidential candidate for the APNU coalition said this is no minor discrepancy. “This is a blatant exposure of the lies and confusion that plague the PPP/C regime. One government, two top-ranking officials, two completely different stories. Only one can be true, if either is.” Mahipaul said the people of Guyana must not be taken for fools. “This $28.7 billion project is not play money. It is your tax dollars, it is our oil revenues, and it is the future of this country’s energy security. When billions are being spent, and the Government can’t even get its story straight, alarm bells must ring. What we are witnessing is not transparency, it is deception in high definition. It is a corrupt, confused, and chaotic regime speaking from both sides of its mouth. Today, the PPP/C stands exposed, not just for its lies, but for its blatant disrespect to the intelligence of the Guyanese people,” Mahipaul stated.

As such he said the APNU Coalition is demanding immediate clarity on the status of the consultancy contract and whether it was it awarded to Method4 or InterEnergy Group, or both.

Secondly, he said the APNU Coalition seeks full disclosure of all consultancy agreements related to the Gas-to-Energy transmission and distribution components. “The PPP/C cannot be allowed to play political football with billions of taxpayers’ dollars while pretending to care about accountability. The only way to end the lies, the contradictions, and the corruption is to vote them out come September 1, 2025. The PPP/C is lying. The question is how many more lies have they told that we haven’t uncovered yet?”

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• Bharrat Jagdeo, Ganesh Mahipaul, GPL, Inter Energy Group, Method4 company, Wales Gas to Energy Plant

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