Contract to complete Guyana’s Local Content Policy was not advertised- Gaskin
By Kiana Wilburg, May 18, 2019 , , Kaieteur News, Online, https://www.kaieteurnewsonline...t-advertised-gaskin/
The contract to complete Guyana’s Local Content Policy was never advertised.
Director of Manufacturing and Marketing, Dominic Gaskin
Only three persons were part of the restrictive tendering process that was used. Local Content Expert, Dr. Michael Warner who is also on ExxonMobil’s payroll, was among the lucky three. He was awarded the $22M contract in February last.
Kaieteur News has been asking several questions regarding the tendering process, but it was only yesterday that answers were given. At a press conference held by the Alliance For Change (AFC), Director of Manufacturing and Marketing, Dominic Gaskin, commented on the matter. Gaskin would have knowledge about the issue to some extent, since his previous job as Business Minister saw him taking a leading role in ensuring the policy was completed.
“I think it was selective tendering. I believe it was three consultants [who] were invited to submit proposals. If I recall, also, there was also some urgency on the part of the public, the political opposition, and even Kaieteur News: ‘No local content policy as yet! No local content policy as yet!’ So, you know, it could have gone out to public tender.
(But) who knows how long that might have taken? So I think [it’s] the smart thing to do…,” Gaskin asserted.
Energy Department Head, Dr. Mark Bynoe
Be that as it may, Guyana’s procurement law is clear-cut about the conditions under which a procuring entity should use “restricted tendering.” According to Section 26 of the Act, a procuring entity may engage in restricted tendering if, “the goods, construction or services by reason of their highly complex or specialised nature, are available only from a limited number of suppliers or contractors.”
Even in such cases, the law makes it clear that not three or four, but all suppliers who can provide the said service or product must be invited to submit a tender.
Director General of the Ministry of the Presidency, Joseph Harmon
Kaieteur News has been able to confirm that all the individuals who can supply the service for Guyana, or did so before, were not invited by the Energy Department to submit a tender for this contract.
HARMON PASSES THE BUCK
At a post-Cabinet press briefing that was held on Thursday, Kaieteur News posed several questions to Director General of the Ministry of the Presidency, Joseph Harmon, on the procurement procedures used for the $22M contract that was awarded in February to Dr. Warner.
Harmon was asked to say if Dr. Warner was sole-sourced for the project, since the Ministry of the Presidency’s website bore no such information about the contract nor does the Procurement Plan for the World Bank-funded capacity development programme, which is managed by the Department of Energy. If he was not sole-sourced, and there was an open tender, the Director General was called on to say who were the other individuals who sent in applications.
But Harmon was quick to pass the buck to Energy Department Head, Dr. Mark Bynoe.
Local Content Expert affiliated with ExxonMobil, Dr. Michael Warner
Harmon had said, “These are matters that are dealt with by the Department of Energy and I cannot comment on the intricacies of whether it went to tender, was sole-sourced or was based on specific qualifications of that person…I can’t give you a precise answer, but the processes which are engaged by the Department of Energy are transparent.”
Asked to say if he can assure that answers can be provided for the questions later that day or before the end of the week, the Director-General said he could not.
Harmon said that he would pass on the questions to Dr. Bynoe. This newspaper tried several times to contact Dr. Bynoe for a response on this matter on Thursday but all efforts proved futile.
BYNOE FINALLY RESPONDS
Instead of facing Kaieteur News and answering its questions on the contract, the Ministry of the Presidency released a video recording of Dr. Bynoe responding to the article that was carried by this newspaper on the matter.
Dr. Bynoe said that there are several procurement processes, which can be used to expedite the award of a contract. Dr. Bynoe said the process used for the $22M Local Content Policy Contract is called a limited competitive selection of individual consultants. He said this is consistent with the World Bank’s regulations of July 2016, which was revised in November 2017 and further in August 2018.
Further to this, the Energy Department Head said that this process allowed for the use of a three CV process and the subsequent assessment of the consultants based on their expertise and qualifications as well as their ability to deliver.
After this assessment, Dr. Bynoe said an evaluation report would have been completed and sent to the
World Bank for its no-objection. Based on that, Dr. Warner was selected as the best candidate to execute the consultancy, the Energy Department head said. He also disclosed that the tender was made available November last year.
Kaieteur News had exposed that Dr. Warner is an employee of DAI, the contractor engaged by ExxonMobil to manage the Local Content Centre for Development located on South Road, Georgetown. But Dr. Bynoe revealed in the video last night that Warner is no longer an employee of DAI.
The Government official also said that when Dr. Warner started the local content process with the Energy Department, he severed links with DAI.
He said, “Dr. Warner was at the time with DAI which is a huge consultancy firm. And he was doing some work with DAI which has been contracted by ExxonMobil to assist with the establishment of the Centre for Local Development.” In the same breath, he said that Warner is “doing part time work with DAI and other individuals.”
In spite of the answers provided, Dr. Bynoe did not say who were the other two individuals given the invite to submit proposals for the tender, who recommended the individuals, what criteria were used to determine their ability to deliver, what level of due diligence was conducted on the invited consultants beyond the mere scrutiny of their work resume, and why three, and not all individuals familiar with providing such services to Guyana, were invited to submit proposals.
