There are serious deficiencies within the construction industry, according to the president of the Bahamian Contractors’ Association (BCA), as no legislation exists to properly govern the sector.
Stephen Wrinkle shared his disappointment with Guardian Business after news broke in the House of Assembly that contractors were reportedly overpaid by $600,000 to $700,000 for their work in the development of landfills throughout the Family Islands.
It was in October 1999 when the government had secured a $23.5 million loan in from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) to carry out the development of 18 landfills in 10 of the Family Islands.
The government’s contribution in the project was $10 million, bringing the value to $33.5 million.
Wrinkle said these findings are particularly disturbing because they are coming to light more than 12 years after the contracts were awarded.
“I think there is a serious deficiency in the accounting if this is just coming to light after 12 years. The fact that it takes them 12 years to find out that they have overpaid contractors for a job makes me wonder. There are two sides to every story. The contractors haven’t said that they were overpaid,” according to Wrinkle.
He pointed out how situations like these create an even bigger problem for the country’s construction industry. At the end of the day, Wrinkle said the lack of transparency in the tendering process is a huge issue that the government needs to address immediately.
“That’s one of the main problems that we have in the country, the tendering process is not transparent,” he explained. “Normally in government contracts there is an independent committee that’s charged with the oversight of tenders and they ensure that the bidding is fair and competitive.”
The BCA chief is calling on the government to adopt the IDB’s process, as he claims the organization has certain standards and guidelines that must be adhered to during the procurement and contract stages of any project. Wrinkle believes it is a very good template to adopt, because as it stands, there are serious deficiencies.
This is why Wrinkle said the BCA has been pushing for the Contractors Bill to be passed.
“Until such time the legislation is passed, there will be no accountability for contractors or the industry as a whole in The Bahamas,” he said.
Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee and Member of Parliament for the Bain and Grants Town constituency Dr. Bernard Nottage, addressed the overpayment of contractors issue yesterday in the lower chamber.
The Department of Environmental Health Services had commissioned two engineering firms, (The Engineering Group and Shepard U Management), to conduct a review of the project to determine whether the government had received value for the public funds, Nottage said.
“The engineering companies had concluded that there had been a large disparity between what should have been paid out and what had in fact been paid out. The firms also determined that there had been overpayments to the contractors to the tune of $600,000 to $700,000.”
In that report, Nottage told parliamentarians that the auditor general had determined that the Department of Environmental Health Services attempted too many projects at one time and did not have adequate staff to oversee the projects, and this inadequacy had resulted in a complete breakdown of internal controls.
It was also determined that at the end of the day, only 14 of the landfills have been completed.
