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Minister of State for Economic Development, Dr. Osmond Martinez, was also asked to weigh in on the political fallout surrounding the departures of Oscar Mira and Florencio Marin Junior from Cabinet responsibilities, amid growing scrutiny of procurement practices within the Ministry of National Defence and Border Security. Interestingly, Dr Martinez is the first Cabinet member interviewed by Love News to say that, in his view, the optics of the recent scandal are not bad for the government. He argued that the response by the Prime Minister demonstrates that concerns are being addressed directly, with an audit now ordered into the ministry’s operations from 2019 through 2026.
Osmond Martinez, Minister of State, Ministry of Economic Development:“You know the optics will always be the optics in politics, nonetheless I don’t think the optics is bad from what we see on the ground, especially with the people I represent. People want to see the work gets done. People have been seeing that under the leadership of Prime Minister Briceño the amount of work that we have done is unprecedented. And the communities, especially those that were neglected for many years, they are finally getting to see the basic needs, you know, simple as water, the water system being connected to them, electricity being carried on to them. But the optics, you know, the optics we always have to manage the optics. And of course it will have an impact but in my view we just have to stay focused and continue to work.”
With the recent revelations of splitting invoices to remain and the circumvention of oversight, Dr Martinez clarified that he is not familiar with these methods. As a matter of fact, he spoke on his experience as a government CEO, and indicated that the Ministry of Economic Development generally handles significantly larger contracts, where the processes and scrutiny are more extensive.
Osmond Martinez, Minister of State, Ministry of Economic Development: “I was CEO in the Ministry of Economic Development and we don’t have to deal with much of those payments, small payments. We have to deal with projects at a large scale and we work with multilaterals. Therefore multilaterals will never release any payments that are below $10,000. It has to be, all projects will have to be tender, all projects will have to carry the no objections from the development partners in every stage of the development. So that is my experience and I was CEO at the Ministry of Public Service initially and we didn’t have to do anything with small purchasing of small items and at the Ministry of Economic Development we work with the multilateral.”
The developments have placed renewed focus on the Ministry of National Defence and Border Security, where Prime Minister John Briceño has now assumed interim responsibility while the audit proceeds.
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