Juice contract and transparency
After many years of PPP/C governance during which there was a heavy veil drawn across the huge procurement sector, the people of this country have an excellent opportunity to begin learning how decisions are made osn high value public contracts and whether they can stand up to scrutiny.
With no Public Procurement Commission (PPC) in place for the entire period of the Jagdeo presidency and not even a Bid Protest Committee, members of the public had no clue as to how billions and billions in contracts were awarded and whether they were assigned to qualified bidders with the wherewithal to execute them. Evaluation committees reviewed the bids that were received after the tenders were advertised but little was known about the work of these committees and there had been wellfounded concerns that they were vulnerable to external influences. The approved bids would then be communicated to Cabinet for its noobjection. A completely unsatisfactory state of affairs and reflected quite frequently in projects that ended up in major problems with hefty cost overruns and sometimes dismissal of the contractor.
While not as quickly as expected, the APNU+AFC government has set about creating greater transparency in the process. Importantly, after nearly 15 years of inaction under the PPP/C, the members of the Public Procurement Commission have received the approval of two thirds of the National Assembly and President Granger now has to appoint them. The tribunal that accompanies the PPC then has to be established.
In lieu of the PPC, the present administration went one step further and created a Bid Protest Committee (BPC) catered for under the procurement law. This committee is intended to address protests by aggrieved bidders. One should bear in mind that no such body existed under the PPP/C and therefore protests had no hope of succeeding or were simply ignored. Contractors were also loath to complain for fear of being victimised in future tendering.
Though initially there was a false start in the appointment of the Chair of the BPC, a new candidate was confirmed and the committee has begun its work. This is a significant development and the committee has already attracted two complaints. These complaints and the manner in which they are disposed of must begin building public confidence in the procurement sector and convince citizens that transparency is being entrenched.
Conversely, any missteps in this process will deepen public scepticism and cynicism over whether the change in government has indeed
brought the transformation in openness and accountability that had been promised. The first protest with the BPC is the one lodged by Cevons in relation to the contract awarded to Puran Brothers for the management of the Haags Bosch landfill site on the East Bank of Demerara. Already, some weeks have elapsed even though the procurement law sets out a tight time frame for resolution of the complaint. One looks forward to a rapid settlement of this complaint and, importantly, the BPC must issue to the public a summary of its decision. This is absolutely vital to building public trust and to transparency in procurement. There is no detail of the procurement process that should validly be declared as confidential unless it pertains to defence matters or state security. The BPC decision must also reflect meticulous examination of the minutiae of the complaint and the committee should have the requisite resources at its disposal to achieve this.
The second complaint raises a number of important issues. It pertains to the juice contract that Surinamese company Rudisa has won to supply the school feeding programme. Rudisa won this contract over Demerara Distillers Limited (DDL), ANSA McAl and Guyana Beverages Inc. A number of technical details have come to public notice via a statement from the Ministry of the Presidency. While DDL was the lowest bidder to supply its Topco juices, the Ministry said it had been advised that there had been reliability issues in previous supply contracts going back to 2012 with DDL. The second lowest bidder was also not entertained as that bid did not fulfil the juice content requirements. These are understandably matters that could determine who wins the contract and the BPC must now set about examining the details to the satisfaction of all parties concerned and, of course, letting the public in on its reasoning. This will necessarily require the shedding of more light on the processes of the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB) and the evaluation committee that examined the bids. How did the committee go about deciding that each bid was responsive? How did the committee, based on the Ministry of the Presidency release, arrive at the conclusion that DDL had been an unreliable supplier in previous contracts? Was this information provided in substantial enough detail by the Ministry of Education to allow a fair conclusion to be drawn? In its press release, the Ministry of the Presidency had said that the second lowest bid did not meet a technical requirement of 25% natural juice content in each box after tests conducted by the Food and Drug Department (F&DD). It is good to know that this test was done by the F&DD. Is it the case that all samples in tenders for the supply of food items are tested by the F&DD to ensure that the required standard is met?
These are the questions, the answers to which, would allow the BPC to shed light on the evaluation committee’s decision.
If handled transparently and straightforwardly, the work of the BPC – an eventually the PPC - can be a major fillip to transparency and accountability in the vast public procurement sector, a development that is much needed in this country.