As the Government continues to tighten loopholes in the public procurement system, Minister of Public Works Juan Edghill has warned that the administration will be clamping down on the practice of entities acquiring a Government contract and then subcontracting it for another company to execute the works.
“Nobody ain’t selling contract hay you know,” Edghill remarked during the recent award ceremony for $6.9 billion in contracts to 389 small contractors in Region Six (East Berbice-Corentyne).
“I is a nice boy, me fingernails clean and suh, and I just collect the contract and I sign and then I ketch Uncle Freddie who like work hard and I say ‘hear wah gonna happen, I giving you it, I get $4 million for me and you tek the rest and finish the people road’,” Edghill explained a scenario that often takes place.
According to the Minister, this practice cannot continue to occur.
“You know why we can’t allow that? When you take out how much you think you should get and then you give Uncle Freddie subcontract, two things wrong: you cheat the system because you know you weren’t doing the work, and number two, with the money you give Uncle Freddie he gotto chip, chip, compromise and give a poor-quality road,” he explained.
He added that “when the engineers come pon the site and they ask for Jainarine Seepaul who is the contractor, here wah the man pon [the site] gonna say ‘meen know who is he, we does wuk for Boodnaraine’…and when we start checking, Jainarine Seepaul never come pon the site yet…he just get paperwork and sign at the Ministry and he done sell and gone.”
“If you are caught subcontracting, kibosh,” the minister expressed.
The government has already issued warnings to the heads and accounting officers of public sector agencies in reaffirming Government’s commitment to enforcing strict compliance with procurement rules.
