On September 30 last year, the Office of the Auditor General met its statutory deadline for the submission to the National Assembly of the annual report of the accounts for ministries, departments and regions for the year 2013. Yet, it was not until June 10th, 2015 that the public was able to learn of its findings when the 11th Parliament met for the first time. It is beyond ridiculous that in a country that has suffered from poor accountability for public expenditure over decades that the premier report on spending can be detained from public scrutiny for nine months because Parliament was not sitting as a result of its prorogation by former President Ramotar. When the law was amended to end the annual presentation of the Auditor General’s report to the Minister of Finance and instead have it presented to the Speaker of the National Assembly for its tabling in Parliament, lawmakers neglected the need to ensure that while the independence of the audit office was being better secured the report should be made available as quickly as possible to the premier stakeholder – the people. The presentation of the report to the Speaker is a mere symbol of the transformation and was not intended to create a special custodianship of the report. In the future, there shouldn’t even be a necessity for the tabling of the report in the National Assembly. It should simply be disseminated after submission to the Speaker.
Whatever value is contained in these annual reports quickly depreciate over time and deny the public, Members of Parliament and those directly affected by its findings the immediacy of action. As it is, nine months have been lost in endeavouring to rectify wrongs in procurement, contracts and in evaluating work. The evaluation shouldn’t be the exclusive preserve of the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament if Article 13 of the Constitution is to have real meaning.
The report of the Auditor General made significant findings in relation to the vexed question of the $800m contract with the now disgraced Indian firm Surendra for the supply of 14 drainage pumps. Prior to this report, the Ministry of Agriculture under the previous government and the National Drainage and Irrigation Authority (NDIA) had proved signally incapable of providing a clear answer on the state of work with the pumps and if Surendra had substantially discharged its obligations. Even the former Head of the Presidential Secretariat, Dr Luncheon was once moved to differ with the then Minister of Agriculture, Dr Ramsammy on whether the supply of the pumps had been completed.
While a substantial part of the contract has been fulfilled there were however significant problems and with the dismissal of the company from its specialty hospital contract with the government in September last year and legal action against it, there is a great possibility that the pumps contract may remain incomplete and that the new administration will have to pursue another court case.
What was a simple procurement and installation project for 14 pumps had not been completed 30 months later based on the findings of the Auditor General’s report. Up to September, 2014, the report said that while seven of the eight fixed pumps were received only four were complete whilst the other three had no pump shafts. The other pump had been reportedly dispatched to Miami, USA to facilitate factory testing.
The Auditor General’s report said that the ministry’s response to its findings on the pump supply project was that the remaining pump shafts and the remaining complete pump had all been factory tested and approved. The ministry further said that dispatch clearance for the shipment had been granted and that it was due to arrive shortly. It further explained that the incomplete pumps were stored at the warehouse of the manufacturer’s agent as the NDIA Stores did not have the lifting capacity to load and unload the pumps.
This all reeks of poor performance by Surendra, lax enforcement of the contract and unaccountability by the former government for important public sector procurement, a longstanding concern of the opposition while the PPP/C was in office. The findings of the Auditor General’s report require an immediate report from the NDIA on the remainder of the project and a declaration of what action will be taken to secure the interest of the state. At last word there was over US$1M in unexpended funds under the Indian financing. On several occasions in these columns, Stabroek News has called for an investigation of this contract and an analysis of the paper trail.
One of the critical challenges for this new government will be to ensure that its management and accountability for state assets, considering the size of the public procurement programme, is impeccable and transparent. There should be no obfuscation and evasiveness about projects undertaken in the name of the people and many of which are financed by loans which have to be repaid by taxpayers. In the case of the Surendra pumps, a year hence, the government should be able to give a perfect accounting for the state of the six mobile pumps and the eight fixed pumps. In each ministry there should be a well-kept asset register with regular annotations and such documents should not only be availed to the bureaucratic centres of the various branches of government but also available to the public.
As a matter of interest, the NDIA and its related drainage bodies should be asked to give an accounting for the large pumps that were supplied by several countries in 2005 during the Great Flood. Are these pumps still functional, have they been cannibalised, which agencies had direct responsibility for them? Otherwise, the risk to the public purse from the reckless and uncaring use of public assets would be high.
Responsibility for state assets must be accompanied by commensurate accountability and culpability. The ill-starred fibre optic cable is one such example. The disclosure last week that 40% of this cable stretching from Brazil to Georgetown is damaged and would not be worth fixing is shocking considering the earlier assurances that had been given about this project by the PPP/C government. Some official must be held accountable over this fiasco.
The APNU+AFC administration must employ a rigorous approach to the care and accountability for state assets. Given their long tenure on the opposition benches and their lamentations over the failings of the PPP/C government, a much higher standard of performance will be expected of them.
