PM orders review of refinery use proposals

Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley has given a new mandate that all reviews of proposals for the Petrotrin Pointe-a-Pierre refinery be completed by November 30.

In a statement yesterday, Energy Minister Franklin Khan said a Cabinet-appointed Evaluation Committee had been reconstituted to peruse all proposals.

“On the instruction of the Prime Minister, the Evaluation Committee appointed by the Cabinet to evaluate the Request for Proposals (RFP) for the use of the Guaracara Pointe-a-Pierre refinery, is required to examine the largest position of the negotiating parties as they stood at the established deadline of October 31,” Khan said.

“This examination and any subsequent recommendations deriving therefrom will be separate and apart from the work and determination of the Cabinet Sub-Committee, which has also received the submissions.”

The statement noted that “the comments and recommendations of the reconstituted Evaluation Committee will be submitted directly to Cabinet. This exercise of review and clarification is to be completed and submitted to Cabinet by November 30th 2020. The Committee is required to examine the largest position of the negotiating parties as they stood at the established deadline of October 31.”

Khan noted that the comments and recommendations of the reconstituted Evaluation Committee will be submitted directly to Cabinet.

Rowley’s intervention came following a request by Oilfield Workers’ Trade Union president-general Ancel Roget for Government to allow the Patriotic proposal to be independently evaluated again by the Cabinet-appointed evaluation committee that initially reviewed the submissions to the ten-point condition (for the sale of the refinery) set out by the Finance Minister Colm Imbert.

Roget said he felt this was necessary because the ministerial team which rejected their latest proposal did not give themselves time to properly review the complex document. (Trinidad and Tobago Guardian)