The JCC: A force still suppressed

Indeed, there is competition and often conflict among its members in their own operations. A convenient analogy would be cricketers or footballers who compete against each other for their clubs, but join to play for the National Team.

The piece which I wrote in 2008 described the angst of the PNM against the criticism and perceived interference of the JCC in government’s physical development philosophy and plans.

“Physical development” refers to designs and construction of roads, bridges, buildings, industries as well as flood mitigation and the like.

While Manning and the PNM were being critical, the UNC was cheering the JCC, using JCC arguments to criticise government’s burgeoning construction programme as being unplanned, poorly prioritised, and favouring foreign construction interests over locals.

But the same UNC, during their turn feeding at the trough of government largesse from 1996 through 2001, were rabidly against the JCC, for its criticisms of the UNC’s construction programmes.

During those years, the PNM in Opposition supported the issues the JCC was raising and saw the JCC as a patriotic institution. Roll back through the years to when the JCC was founded in the mid 1970s and you will find that the JCC was always befriended and supported by the opposition, regardless of who sat on that side, and was attacked by the government regardless of who controlled the trough.

The JCC developed in the 1970s to protect the local industry from Dr Eric Williams’ decision to by-pass the locals and ask foreign governments to “send” their out-of-work contractors to build our country.

They came, without the benefit of tenders, or controls from our professionals, and were given priority access to our materials already in short supply—cement, gravel and blocks, critical components in every building project.

This, you might agree is like having to bake bread, but with shortages of flour and yeast, and trying to bake more by hiring more bakers. They were also given priority in payments, while locals who had completed projects were made to wait years for payments.

And yet, with all these advantages, the government-to-government contractors failed to build better or more quickly, or at lower costs than locals. And many left our country with our money, owing suppliers and subcontractors. To this day, the JCC is asking that foreign contractors be required to post bonds which can be “called” to pay local bills should they default.

This history alone should be noted by the media, the public and the people who alternate in bringing and overseeing the construction programmes of the State—our politicians.

But with regards to the politicians, they only note the value of a group of dedicated professionals, many actually working within government, state entities and our universities, when they are in Opposition.

And that rather long prologue brings us to the present, and a seminar hosted by the JCC last Wednesday.

Titled “Economic Revitalisation through Mobilisation of the Construction Sector”, this seminar was opened by Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley, who stayed to hear a couple of the recommendations, and was briefly visited by the Ministers of Planning and Development and Works and Infrastructure.

The new Minister of Works and Infrastructure could have become more informed had he arrived on time and sat through the day’s sessions.

But like most ministers of both parties, he no doubt believes that becoming truly informed is an unnecessary burden to carry.

One could not help leaving the allday session without feeling a sense of despair, and for me, almost doom.

All of the issues identified from the 1970s, through to the present, still remain as unresolved deterrents to the efficient development of the country’s infrastructure and public buildings stocks.

Current issues of procurement legislation and transparency are on the JCC’s front burner, and despite government’s promise to have the procurement legislation effective by March 31, 2017, professional analyses indicate that this is hardly possible.

Transparency remains a sheet of lead, as this government is now joining the UNC to keep hidden the alleged legal opinion which the UNC claims gave them the “right” to award a contract in defiance of the law.

And this in spite of our High Court and our Appeal Court ruling that the opinion belongs to “we the people” and should be revealed.

The State suppression of the truth and the JCC continues, to the detriment of the potential development of our country.

Nothing ever changes.