– PPP/C Parliamentary Opposition welcomes MESICIC on-site visit
The People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Parliamentary Opposition has welcomed the on-site team from the Organisation of American States (OAS) Anti-Corruption Mechanism (Follow up Mechanism for the Implementation of the Inter-American Convention Against Corruption- MESICIC) that is currently in Guyana.
The team’s on-site visit (from September 25-27, 2017) is part of the process of the Fifth Round Review of Guyana under the Convention.
“We, in the Parliamentary Opposition, are proud that Guyana ratified the Inter-American Convention Against Corruption in December 2000, and became a State Party to the MESICIC in June 2002,” a statement from the Office of Leader of the Opposition said Monday evening.
It pointed out that this Convention is the first and oldest anti-corruption convention and one with an enormous institutional experience in moving countries progressively forward in developing anti-corruption frameworks and greater transparency and accountability.
“Guyana’s first review was held in 2006, and, Guyana has been reviewed and its reports adopted through four Rounds of Review ending in March 21, 2014,” the Opposition Leader’s Office pointed out.
In preparation for the last review, Guyana was the first Caribbean country to formally indicate its acceptance of an on-site visit from the MESICIC, which was held from October 8 to 13, 2013 at which civil society bodies participated and made their views candidly known. The Transparency Institute of Guyana, the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Guyana, the Guyana Women Lawyers Association, the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Consultative Association of Guyanese Industry, and the Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Guyana participated.
Guyana on February 6, 2015, again formally indicated its acceptance of a second on-site visit for the Fifth Round Review scheduled for 2017.
“We are concerned and surprised that there has been no public announcement by the Government or the Guyana Expert sitting on the MESICIC, Aubrey Retemyer, Major (retired), Chief Executive Officer of the controversial, politically influenced State Assets Recovery Agency, about the on-site visit as is customary and required by the MESICIC,” the Opposition PPP/C stated.
“Of note is that this Round will focus on Article 111 (paragraph 3 and 12) as well as follow up on recommendations made in the Second Round and progressively reported on up to the Fourth Round. These recommendations continue to be significant and important to Guyana, more particularly, due to developments that have been emerging in Guyana over the last 27 months with the change of Government,” the Opposition pointed out.
It said these recommendations include:
“SYSTEMS OF GOVERNMENT HIRING AND PROCUREMENT OF GOODS AND SERVICES (ARTICLE III (5) OF THE CONVENTION)
1.1. Government hiring systems
– Establish, maintain and strengthen the systems of Government hiring of public servants, when applicable, that assure the openness, equity and efficiency of such systems…”
The PPP/C Opposition said “the dismissal of 1972 Amerindian (Indigenous) Community Service Officers in July 2015, and over a thousand public servants based on ethno-political discrimination over the last 26 months violates the rights and provisions of the Guyana Constitution and the Public Service Rules. In contrast, 1000 persons have been hired into the public service on contract by 2016 February with little regard for the Public Service Rules, the majority are political operatives and over the retirement age. A further 1000 were added by mid-2017 under the same conditions. The recent establishment of the Bertram Collins College of the Public Service has become another institution to enforce Government control of the hiring and upward mobility of public servants.”
Furthermore, the PPP/C Opposition said instances of executive interference, “too numerous to enumerate here, in all three of the constitutionally protected Service Commissions – Public, Police and Judicial – is alarming and a gross violation of the Constitution”.
It pointed out that the Chairman of the Public Service Commission, an appointed member of the Commission, was removed both as Chairman and member in violation of the Constitution. The Public Service Commission appointed in 2014 was reduced to three members and then expired on September 1, 2017.
Four judicial officers recommended by the Judicial Service Commission in April 2016 to the President for appointment in accordance with the Constitution were not appointed until a year later, and only after public pressure.
The Local Government Commission Act 2014 has not been brought into effect as the Government has not issued the Commencement Order. The non-appointment of the Local Government Commission, which has responsibility to appoint public servants in the 71 local government authorities, has led to ministerial appointments, replacement of staff, dismissal and transfer of staff in these bodies in violation of the Public Service Rules. In the interim, four members have been nominated, one through the required consensual mechanism in the National Assembly and three nominated by the Leader of the Opposition in accordance with the Act; however, the four Government appointees have not been named to date.
“In addition, of great concern, is that the 2016 and 2017 Budgets of all the constitutional agencies were reduced by the Minister of Finance in violation of the Constitution and the 2015 Amendment to the Financial Management and Accountability Act,” the PPP/C Opposition stated.
“1.2. Systems for Government procurement of goods and services
– Promote the adoption of provisions, in the Government systems for the procurement of goods and services, which ensure the principles of openness, equity and efficiency under the Convention”
Under this rubric, there are specific recommendations that call for the Government to “develop and implement provisions that punish public officials in cases of non-compliance with the public procurement rules, without prejudice to any other laws under the existing system; and criminalise those who act as accessories after the fact with respect to corruption offences, as required by Article VI (1) (e) of the Convention.”
According to the Opposition PPP/C, the Government has fired many officers in the system who worked with the previous Government based on forensic audits, which were commissioned without public tender and contrary to the Audit Act.
“Of note is that many of these private auditors are known to be politically aligned. Many of these auditors have not allowed the agencies being audited to see and respond to their findings before they were published. Although charges have been brought against five officers, present-day exposures of wrongdoing and serious breaches of the procurement process and rules have not led to any sanctions,” the PPP/C Opposition stated.
It noted that there was a long list of projects that had been sole sourced, particularly with large infrastructural works. Most recently, the abandonment of a public tender process where 22 foreign companies submitted Expressions of Interest and the secret resort to sole sourcing of the feasibility study for the new Demerara River Bridge has been exposed.
“There is ongoing and consistent procurement of pharmaceutical and medical supplies totalling billions of dollars in breach of any semblance of competitive bidding. For this year alone, $2 billion (70 per cent) of the budget for pharmaceuticals and medical supplies have been purchased without going to tender; in one case, the request to the NPTAB [National Procurement and Tender Administration Board] to waiver tender procedures to procure over $605 million from one company was denied and yet the Ministry of Public Health went ahead,” the Opposition stated.
Furthermore, it said the long list of sole-sourced projects includes those awarded to election “financiers” of the Government. “Ministers have even sought to justify tampering with the legal requirements, and the abandonment of the tender procurement procedures is now common place,” the Opposition charged.
It added that the transition required in the Procurement Act with regard to the role of Cabinet’s “no objection” was not being adhered to.
Progress that Guyana had been making with regard to the Convention, the Procurement Act and Regulations, the National Procurement and Tender Administration, and even the newly- appointed Public Procurement Commission “is being constantly and systemically dismantled”, the PPP/C posited. It said the Procurement Act and financial rules were being honoured in the breach as the country reels from one corruption scandal to another.
The OAS 2014 draft guidelines for whistleblower legislation have not produced a bill for the National Assembly’s review to date and thus the 2014 recommendations remain unimplemented.
Available mechanisms to have access to information, and greater transparency and accountability such as questions and motions in the Legislature have had limited success, and parliamentary oversight bodies such as the Public Accounts Committee and the Parliamentary Sectoral Committees have contributed eight of the 11 committee reports pending on the Order Paper, some for as long as nine months.
For the first time in the history of the Guyana Parliament, Ministers now sit on the Public Accounts Committee, one of whom is the subject of an investigation. The four sectoral oversight committees of the Government’s policies and performance also now include Ministers. These developments are in clear violation of the intention of the Constitution and the Parliamentary Standing Orders to strengthen scrutiny of Government expenditure, policies and performance.
The Government defeated the 2016 Opposition motion calling for all Members of Parliament to make public their income tax declarations and submissions to the Integrity Commission for the last 10 years. The Government has not appointed the Integrity Commission. Furthermore, a request by the Leader of the Opposition to hire an international firm specialised in tracing assets of former and current Government officials has not solicited any response from the Government.
“The NPTA website, a critical measure that allows for public access and scrutiny of the procurement process, is now more limited in access to information than four years ago. The electronic procurement system, started in 2014, seems to have been abandoned. This lack of information and public disclosure, including the introduction of non-disclosure clauses in contracts of awards of tenders, have made it even more difficult to know what is going on at the various stages of the procurement of Government goods and services,” the Opposition charged.
“There are no public statistics available on procurement whether by method – public, restricted, sole sourced – of goods and services nor on the number of contracts awarded at what price and to whom. Questions to Ministers on specific tenders take a long time to be answered, or are never answered in the National Assembly,” the Opposition said.
It pointed out that the Commissioner of Information under the Access to Information Act is denied an office and staff and, therefore, could not function effectively.
“These acts are indicative of an environment cultivated by the Government based on nepotism and corruption and one that is deliberately designed to deny transparency and accountability. Were it not for the progress made by Guyana through constitutional and legal reforms since it ratified the Inter-American Convention to enhance transparency and accountability, the public would be even more removed and uninformed,” the PPP/C Opposition argued.
According to the PPP/C Opposition, it is clear that the Government has paid scant attention to the Inter-American Convention Against Corruption and its obligations to work in “good faith” to implement the recommendations of the MESICIC. In contrast, the reversal of the progress made by Guyana in implementing the Convention is conspicuous. Despite the rhetoric about anti-corruption, the country is being mired in the depths of corruption, the Opposition charged.
It noted that the above-mentioned examples are by no means an exhaustive list.
“Although the Parliamentary Opposition has not been invited to be part of the review, we, however, stand ready to meet with the OAS MESICIC review team,” the Opposition stated.
