All does not seem well at the IDB local office

Dear Editor,
The Finance Ministry has on numerous occasions over the recent past alluded to poor project and performance for the Public Service Investment Programme. Last week, a high-level IDB mission, led by its senior Vice President, was also in Guyana to review the IDB bank portfolio as it relates to IDB performance in Guyana. Many people have been blaming the current Government for not doing enough in terms of investment and economic activities. The Finance Minister recently was seemingly very upset at the slow pace of implementation of the Public Service Investment/Improvement Plan or activities. Huge sums of monies remain unspent despite being provided for in the budget. No fault, of course, to the policymakers but rather the implementing agencies and PSs. I do hope the state of affairs improves. The Opposition PPP has been using this as a weapon against the Government.
But while the state of affairs of the Public Sector projects is bad, the state of affairs of project implementation at the IDB Guyana is appalling and shocking. No wonder the pace of implementation of many projects is at a standstill in many cases. The IDB was supposed to help the Government with public projects. But rather the IDB has found itself wanting and in a state of total despair. One just has to look at the recent country strategy report that gives an overview of the Bank’s performance in terms of portfolio management and one would see the alarming rate of disbursements and project implementation at the bank level. With this low level of project implementation and thus project disbursement, the Public Service Investment Programme is bound to fail. (Please see extract from the IDB Country Report for Guyana).
There is also growing concern over the Bank’s performance as it relates to participation or funding of contracts whereby the procurement that has been executed has been deemed not transparent or there is lack of transparency in the contract award and yet the Bank finds itself funding the particular project. The GPL Smart Meter Project is one such example. Recently, the Leader of the Opposition signalled his intention to write IDB Washington about some of the same issues being highlighted about the Bank’s funding being used for projects which the procurement executed lacks or seems to lack transparency. All does not seem well at the IDB local office.

Sincerely,
Christine Cadogan