Sole sourcing should not be the standard – TIGI

…Govt circumventing transparency by continuing practice

The Government’s continued reliance on sole sourcing for the public health sector has drawn the attention of Transparency Institute of Guyana Inc (TIGI).
TIGI President Dr Troy Thomas has stressed that by continuing to sole source from companies who are in some cases not pre-qualified, there can be no guarantee of value for tax payers’ money.
Thomas told this publication that TIGI has also noted that the problems within the health sector, including incidents of sole sourcing drugs and medical supplies, have been recurring, but should have been stamped out by now. He noted that Government has instead gone ahead and sole sourced from a blacklisted company.
This is a reference to an incident of a few weeks ago, when Cabinet approved a contract for Trinidad company Western Scientific to supply millions of dollars’ worth in Sysmex reagents to the Public Health Ministry although that the firm was only last year blacklisted by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) because of what the donor agency referred to as “fraudulent practices.”
“The Government of Guyana needs to consider (whether) it is fixing a broken system or realigning whatever fractures exist. If you say that so much is broken and wrong and you want to be transparent, and then you’re using these means (sole sourcing) to fix it, that doesn’t inspire confidence,” Thomas said.

On May 08, the Parliamentary Opposition had fielded questions in the National Assembly to the ministers of Public Health and Communities in relation to the public procurement practices being used by the Government.
When a response came from the Communities Minister Ronald Bulkan, it was revealed that nine out of 10 regions in Guyana did no public tendering for drugs and medical supplies between January 2016 and February 2017.
In addition, all regions indicated that no prequalification process was followed. Procurement of drugs and medical supplies had all been done in the name of emergencies.
In the case of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC), Opposition Parliamentarian Juan Edghill had noted that 77 per cent of the total allocations for drugs for that entity (GPHC) had been expended.