Auditor General, Deodat Sharma
Officials at the Regional Tender Board in Linden found themselves in hot water when Auditor General, Deodat Sharma discovered that a contractor was able to get a Final Inspection Certificate, one month before a contract could even be signed.
What is also startling is the fact that Regional Tender Board officials granted permission for the contractor to receive almost full payment for works on the same day the contract document was signed.
The certificate is issued as conformation that the project has been completed.
The Auditor General noted that this is an utter disregard for the nation’s procurement laws.
Detailing the situation in his latest report, Sharma stated that the matter involves a contract for the rehabilitation of Church Road, Block 22 in Linden. It was awarded by the Regional Tender Board in the sum of $5.904M to the lowest of seven responsive bidders.
There was an approved variation of $2.538M, revising the total contract sum to $8.442M.
But after examining several contract documents, Sharma made some alarming discoveries. For starters, Sharma noted that the agreement for the contract, a request for 90 percent of the contract sum to be paid out and an approval document for payment by the Regional Engineer, were all made on the same date —December 4, 2017.
Sharma said that the Regional Executive Officer (ag) then approved the documents for payment the next day, December 5, 2017.
By December 31, 2017, Sharma found that the full contract sum was paid to the contractor with an overpayment of $96,000.
The Auditor General said, “It was difficult to ascertain how on the same day of signing the contract, the value of the works completed could have been in the vicinity of 90% of the contract sum. In addition, our examination of the aforementioned payment further revealed that there was a variation in the value of $2.538M, comprised in the payment request of December 4, 2017.”
To make matters worse, Sharma discovered that the contractor was in possession of a Final Inspection Certificate which was signed by the contractor, the Regional Engineer and the Chairman of the Regional Works Committee dated November 10, 2017, or approximately one month before the contract document was even signed to allow works to begin.
In response to the Auditor General’s findings, all the Budget Agency had to say is that it will go after the overpaid sums. They were at the time, unable to provide an explanation for Sharma’s other findings.
Sharma’s office subsequently recommended that steps be taken to recover the overpayment; and that Linden’s Budget Agency ensures that completed works are accurately measured and quantified before payments are made to contractors for works completed.
He also called on the Agency to make every effort to clarify how the works could have been deemed completed by way of a Final Inspection Certificate before the contract could be inked and to explain to him, how the contract agreement, and 90% valuation for payment and variation, all occurred on the same date.
