Questions the Government cannot cancel

Mickela Panday

This week, the Housing Development Corporation quietly cancelled its controversial $3.4 billion Design-Build-Finance housing procurement exercise. Not postponed. Not revised. Not adjusted. Cancelled.

After the intended awards had already been announced. After concerns had been raised. After the Office of Procurement Regulation intervened. And before the public has been informed of the results of that review.

The HDC’s explanation was brief. The corporation stated that it had determined it was in the “public interest” to discontinue the procurement proceedings. That explanation raises more questions than it answers.

What changed?

For weeks, Government representatives defended the procurement exercise. Ministers defended the Design-Build-Finance model. The process was presented as lawful, innovative and necessary to address the country’s housing challenges.

When concerns were raised, Government officials continued to defend the exercise.

Today, that same procurement exercise has been abandoned. Surely the public deserves more than a vague reference to “the public interest.”

This is not a minor administrative matter. The proposed awards totalled more than $3 billion. The project was intended to expand the national housing stock and address a housing shortage affecting thousands of families.

Housing is not an abstract policy discussion. It is about young couples trying to purchase their first home, families living in overcrowded conditions and citizens who have spent years waiting for an opportunity to achieve stability and security.

That is why transparency matters. When billions of dollars are involved, transparency is not optional. It is an obligation. But perhaps the most troubling aspect of this entire affair is the timing.

The Office of Procurement Regulation intervened in April and directed that the process be suspended pending a review. Since then, the public has been waiting to learn what that review uncovered.

The expectation was straightforward. The review would be completed. The relevant findings would be known. Citizens would have an opportunity to judge the facts for themselves. Instead, before the public has been informed of the results of that review, the procurement exercise has been cancelled altogether. Why?

Did the review influence the decision? Were concerns identified? Were deficiencies discovered? Did the findings raise issues that made continuation impossible?

These are not partisan questions. They are questions of accountability.

Because when a procurement exercise worth $3.4 billion is cancelled while a regulatory review remains undisclosed, the public is left in an information vacuum. And governments that create vacuums inevitably create suspicion.

The HDC has confirmed that the reasons for cancelling the procurement exercise have been recorded in accordance with the Procurement Act. If reasons exist and have been documented, citizens are entitled to ask why those reasons have not been made public.

The Government now has an opportunity to restore confidence. Whether through the publication of the OPR’s findings, the release of the reasons recorded by the HDC, or some other formal explanation, the public deserves a full account of what led to the cancellation of this procurement exercise.

After all, if the procurement exercise was cancelled in the public interest, then releasing the information that informed that decision is also in the public interest.

This controversy also does not exist in isolation.

In a previous column, I raised concerns surrounding the Landmark TT matter and the growing gap between what citizens are told and what later emerges. Landmark TT was established with Cabinet approval just months after this Government took office and was presented as a vehicle for advancing major development projects.

Questions were raised. The public was told not to worry. Yet today, as we await the OPR report, many of those questions surrounding LandMark TT and its Board remain unanswered while the project continues to move full speed ahead. Again, we find ourselves confronting another major initiative that has generated concerns, attracted regulatory attention and left the public seeking clarity.

Different project. Different circumstances. Yet the citizens keep finding themselves in the same position, being asked to trust first and receive explanations later. This pattern is becoming familiar; concerns are dismissed until circumstances force a different outcome. What is often missing is accountability. What is often missing is transparency. And what is increasingly being lost is trust. That should concern everyone, regardless of political affiliation.

Public institutions depend on confidence. Citizens must believe that procurement rules are applied fairly, regulators are allowed to do their work and major public decisions are explained openly.

When transparency is absent, confidence erodes, not only in a particular project but in the institution responsible for managing it.

That is why the questions surrounding this procurement exercise matter, because every time transparency gives way to secrecy, every time legitimate concerns are dismissed rather than addressed, and every time citizens are asked to accept assurances in place of explanations, confidence in our public institutions is weakened.

Governments come and go. Institutions remain. And those institutions can only function effectively when citizens believe they are operating fairly, openly and in the public interest. That confidence cannot be demanded. It must be earned.

The Government now has an opportunity to begin earning it.

Mickela Panday is Political Leader of the Patriotic Front and an Attorney at Law