Hughes calls for restructuring of NPTAB amid controversial contract awards

Alliance For Change (AFC) leader, Nigel Hughes on Friday reiterated his call for the restructuring of the National Procurement and Tender Administration Board (NPTAB). He pointed to controversies surrounding the award of contracts for the Schoonord to Crane Road project, specifically referencing the questionable awards for Lots Three and Four.

In relation to Lot Three, the AFC leader said, “That contract was awarded to a company…there were 16 tenders lower than the awarded contractor and curiously, none of them were deemed evaluated i.e. responsive by NPTAB.”

He further criticized the awarding of Lot Four, saying that the contract was not awarded to the lowest bidder, among the 20 contractors who submitted their proposals.

“NPTAB would have us believe that none of them were deemed to have been evaluated or responsive,” Hughes added. He further revealed troubling details about the awarded company’s joint venture with a Trinidadian firm that was previously found guilty by Trinidadian courts of inflating estimates for a project in Suriname.

“It is clear that we have a crisis,” he asserted.

Hughes emphasised that these recent incidents are not isolated, citing multiple serious disclosures regarding NPTAB in the past month.

Recently, the Public Procurement Commission (PPC) flagged the award of a $2.1 billion Guyana Defence Force (GDF) wharf project to Kares Engineering Inc., saying that the award was not made to the most responsive bidder. Since then, Hughes has criticized the current structure of NPTAB for its persistent failures and lack of representation from essential professional bodies, opposition and civil society.

He had cited that the PPC had also flagged the $865 million pump station contract awarded to Tepui Group, a company closely linked to social media commentator Mikhail Rodrigues known as ‘Guyanese Critic.’

“Given the frequency of the disclosures in relation to NPTAB, it clearly is in need of restructuring and perhaps the head of NPTAB may want to consider other alternatives at this point in time,” Hughes concluded.