Guyana’s Newest Battleground– The Oil and Gas Sector (Part II)

In my last column, I pointed out that on Guyana’s newest battleground, a raft of critical elements indispensable to good governance and democracy are either struggling to breathe or have already become casualties. Significant among these are truth, ethics, integrity, transparency, accountability, fairness, justice, inclusive governance, reasonableness, equality, environmental and social stability, and geopolitics. In this week’s column I would discuss a few other causalities. 

Fairness and equitable distribution of the benefits of these resources are other casualties on this battleground. Not a single member of the opposition sits on the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board. Where are the checks and balances? Yet, this is the body that awards all state contracts worth hundreds of billions of dollars. A substantial percentage of these billions is Guyanese tax dollars. 

This is a serious point because public servants, (PAYE) and businesses are expected to contribute to the public purse, as part of their corporate responsibility, through the system of taxation but their political representatives whom they have elected to look out for their interests are deliberately excluded from participating in the process of award of contracts. This state of affairs has implications at two levels: (i) The lack of critical monitoring and evaluation of awards of contracts. This creates the ideal environment for corruption and its attendant evils. Only one half of the population gets to decide who should be awarded contracts to do works or provide goods and services to everyone else. This model, coupled with the unhealthy subtle affinity between party operatives and certain members of the board, could lend itself to under hand, indirect governmental control of the levers of powers in the award of contracts. They decide who gets what and when. Nota bene, this is Realpolitik. 

If one were to unbundle the scope, substance and standards of this model then one would discover that it provides a partisan path for the incumbent and party associates to access powers that allow this authoritarian party- PPP/C to covertly facilitate the personal, private, and commercial development of its cronies, neophytes and friends. 

Perhaps, no better illustration of the dysfunctionality of this model can be found that in its award of contract to Tepui Group Inc. to the tune of $865 million taxpayers’ dollars; a freshly minted company without a history or track record of works, technical experience or engineering competency.  Perhaps, too, if that company had the engineering and technical competencies to execute certain projects then the life of the now deceased 36 years old crane operator could have been saved from that fatal accident, that occurred last week, at Providence East Bank Demerara. Maybe an independent investigation into this matter, by a committee of competent engineers, might reveal the truth.  Otherwise, we may never know.

My point, here, is that, it is not only about the millions of taxpayers’ money given to those who fall below the required standards but also the public health and safety of those, who work with such companies as well as the safety of members of the public who must use these facilities. Awarding contracts to companies that lack experiences and technical requirements compromises the integrity of public health and safety of our citizens. Beyond that, engineers and contractors who are sufficiently competent to execute such public works with great efficiency are denied work because it was already given to someone else. 

(ii)  This shadowy system reinforces the conclusion, by many, that it allows the government to augment what appears to be a clear intention, on its part, to ‘dumb down’ and stifle the economic growth and development of those who do not agree with and speak out against its unfair and discriminatory policies and practices. As a result, our society is developing in an unbalanced way with high fragmentation, much confusion and racial and other tensions. It is affecting civil comity, and the good spirit of community.

Still, in the face of this flagrant discrimination and unfairness, the government tries to crowbar the one Guyana mantra into the nation’s psyche.  This is a false consciousness or distortions of reality. In fact, this one Guyana mantra no longer makes sense for there is nothing left against which to measure the accuracy of it. This vaunted one Guyana mantra is at best a simulacrum.