Discrepancies have been discovered in the award of consultancy contracts for the design of four packing houses by the National Agricultural Marketing and Development Corporation (Namdevco). This is the finding of an independent committee set up by the Ministry of Food Production in May. The contracts, totalling approximately $3.5 million, were awarded without board approval in January and March.
The packing houses are among five to be built at Wallerfield, Brickfield, La Gloria, Cushe and Brechin Castle, Couva, at an estimated cost of $8 million to $10 million each. Last Thursday Food Production Minister Devant Maharaj and Local Government and Works Minister Suruj Rambachan turned the sod for the construction of the packing house at Brickfield. At present construction is under way on the packing house facility at Brechin Castle, Couva.
The contracts involve project management services for the design of the packing house facilities and are valued at 10 per cent of the cost of each. However, in April the board discovered that all four contracts had been awarded without the necessary approval. At an emergency meeting on April 16, the board decided to suspend CEO Krishna Ramrattan pending the investigation. As CEO, Ramrattan has a spending limit of $50,000.
The committee found that Ramrattan did not act on his own but was facilitated by two other senior officials. However, it said, Ramrattan was aware of all decisions surrounding the contracts. And while Ramrattan indicated that he was not part of the procurement procedure, the committee said he admitted to being part of the tenders committee of the board, which is part of the process.
The report, which was obtained by the T&T Guardian, said, “It appears from documents that at all times the CEO was aware of the practices taking place in attempting to move the packing house project forward.” According to the committee, competitive bidding should have been used to invite interested companies to tender for the consultancy phase of the project, and not standard procurement procedure.
The committee frowned upon this, saying, “Engagement of consultants for preliminary discussions which included such activities as receipts of a design brief and preparation of schedules is not part of the normal procurement procedure.” Referring to the letters given to the consultants, titled “Assignment of project management services,” the committee went on, “It is not part of the procurement procedure in that the form and the content of the letters are ambiguous.”
The letters, the committee said, could be construed by some as contracts. As to how consultants were assigned to particular sites, that remained a mystery to the committee, as investigations revealed that “no clear assessment appears to have been done.” The committee concluded that the failure to comply with proper procurement procedures might result in litigation if Namdevco did not pursue the projects with the same consultants.
Ramrattan, contacted on Thursday, said, “I have no comment to make.”
Maharaj shocked by findings
Commenting on the report on Thursday, line minister Devant Maharaj said he was “shocked” by the findings. “It was following a report in the T&T Guardian relating to questionable operations at Namdevco that I asked the chairman to do an internal review of the award of contracts for the last two years,” he said.
“I got a number of disturbing reports concerning inconsistencies at Namdevco and a committee was set up to investigate the reports highlighted. “What was discovered was that several contracts were given out without board approval and as such I have now requested the board to take action to deal with the breach with the procurement procedures.
“It appears certain elements in management were doing as they wished without the board being aware of those activities.” The Ministry of Finance is expected to do an audit at Namdevco in the upcoming weeks, the minister said.
Committee members:
Acting deputy permanent secretary Stephanie Elder-Alexander
Senior legal adviser Natasha Hosein
Administrative officer/records manager Omar Mohammed
Engineer Rodney Ramkeesoon