Excuses to hide incompetence

THE EDITOR: I had just begun writing this letter to complain about the “bad mouthing” of the Central Tenders Board  (CTB) when I learnt of Government’s plans to establish a private company to assist the Minister of Education run her ministry; this news so stunned me that I had to stop, in mid sentence as it were, to reconsider what I had previously planned to pen.

A week later after much mulling over whether penning my true thoughts would get me totally, rather than partially — as it appears to be presently — blacklisted (apologies to Selwyn Cudjoe, Bukka Rennie etc) from practising my, or rather my company’s skills for the benefit of the people of Trinidad and Tobago I have finally come to the conclusion that I would not be loyal to my beliefs by staying silent. For the past thirty years, the approximate time I have been a resident in Trinidad, I have watched successive governments seek ways to avoid being accountable and transparent in the way that they conduct their capital public works programmes. To achieve this they have foisted on the unsuspecting public all manner of strange development enterprises with strange, sometimes unpronounceable, names or acronyms; all with, I believe, one purpose in mind — the avoidance of transparent and accountability to the public at large. Why have governments alleged this to be necessary? Because the was not able to process the peoples’ business with the alacrity that the nation demanded: absolute twaddle!!

In all of my years of either being part of a team of specialists through whom the nation’s business was mandated to be conducted through the CTB, or on the receiving end of their deliberations, I have never once found them to be guilty of the charges and complaints laid at their door. Indeed insofar as my company’s more recent activities are concerned, where the CTB were an integral part of a multi-lateral funding agency’s procurement procedure, I have found the CTB to be extremely efficient and conducting itself with the integrity that their position requires. I postulate that any delays caused to a programme in question can only come about as a result of the relevant ministry’s technocrats or their consultants’ ignorance of the procedures required by the CTB for it to act efficiently. Whether this is in innocence or by design, well I’ve already made my views on that known!

The product of all these neo governmental establishments, with their own obscure and largely unaccountable procedures, is that the nation is blind to how or even why their money is being spent or the equally or value for money it is receiving. To suggest that they are open to corruption will of course get me locked up so I won’t say it, however I do know that they are exposed to all manner of political interference and persuasion, which more often or not only becomes apparent later in the day when it is too late, the current court actions concerning the construction of an airport excepted, for any (willing) agency to do anything about it.

In my humble opinion the only way for governments to properly conduct their business in this regard is through the CTB. Indeed I am firmly of the opinion that if the present (and successive?) Governments are serious about proper conduct, transparency and accountability of the peoples business that they will ensure (and enshrine) the following: That the Central Tenders Board are the sole manger of the issuance of public capital works tenders. That the CTB will be the sole awarder of all public capital works contracts. That the CTB is properly established and equipped to conduct their business as the Act requires.

I do however accept that, largely as a result of the underpayment of civil servants, that many ministries are unable to manage the execution of their capital programmes and consequently must unavoidably seek outside “professional” help and that often the best way to achieve this is through these non-governmental agencies; they, after all, are not hamstrung by the inadequate salary scales of the civil service. Therefore until such time as governments realise that they must pay public servants the going rate the nation will be stuck with an under-performing, albeit often willing and most helpful, public service. However, managing the execution of these works must not extend to having their own “tenders committees” and such.

All procurement should — indeed must — be carried out through the CTB, under their legislated rules and regulations with all technocrats and consultants engaged in the process being fully familiar with, and be prepared to so conduct their work to meet these requirements. It is only in this way that the nation can be confident that their business is at least being started off properly (I will leave my observations on the “strange” procurement results and consequent performance failures for a later date).

If the nation is to even approach, let alone attain, first world status it must be prepared to insist that this almost enshrined habit of beating up on the CTB as a way to avoid transparency and accountability must cease immediately: and this includes the conduct of this latest “new company” which, it appears, is only yet another excuse for covering up a ministry’s managerial incompetence.

WILLIAM G WATSON
St Ann’s