Dear Editor,
The Stabroek News article captioned ‘Chair of Bid Protest Committee resigns’ published in its July 27, 2016 edition is false. I never told Stabroek News that I was appointed Chair of the Bid Protest Committee and I did not say to the newspaper that I resigned from the said committee.
Yours faithfully,
Renée McDonald
Editor’s note
An advertisement published by the Ministry of Finance in our June 26, 2016 edition, headed ‘Notice of Bid Protest Procedures’ makes clear that Ms McDonald was the Chair of the Bid Protest Committee. Item 4 reads: “The NB Administration shall conduct bid protest reviews through an independent, three (3) person Bid Protest Committee (BPC) comprising: Ms. Renée McDonald – Chairperson, Mr Archibald Clifton and Mr. Ewart Adams…”
When Stabroek News reporter Ms Marcelle Thomas contacted Ms McDonald on July 26, therefore, she did not need to ask whether the latter had been appointed Chair of the Bid Protest Committee, because the Ministry of Finance had already made that public. What she did ask Ms McDonald was the reason for her resignation from the Committee, and at no point did Ms McDonald say that that she could not resign because she had never been appointed in the first place.
Furthermore, Ms McDonald did not deny that she had resigned; she gave one brief affirmation of that – “Yeah” ‒ and then referred Ms Thomas to the Attorney General. She again referred the reporter to the Attorney General for a response to the query as to whether anyone else had been nominated or appointed Chair of the Bid Protest Committee.
