Imbert: Procurement Bill did not ‘scrape through' Senate

FINANCE Minister Colm Imbert sought to correct Opposition MP Roodal Moonilal's claim that the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Property (Amendment) Bill, 2020 “scraped its way through" the Senate.

Imbert said the margin of victory was ten votes and called on the media to “present the true facts.”

The bill – which amends the Public Procurement Act of 2015 – was debated in the House of Representatives last Friday. It was passed without Opposition support, with 21 votes for and 18 against, and was then sent to be debated in the Senate.

On Tuesday night, it was passed in the Senate. All but one independent Senator – Dr Maria Dillon-Remy – abstained and the Opposition voted against.

The final vote was 16 for, six against and eight abstentions.

Speaking in Parliament on Friday afternoon, Moonilal said, “It is public knowledge now that this bill had a somewhat difficult passage in the other place and scraped its way through to be here today.”

He then spoke about one amendment, to clause four, which adjusted the definition of bid-rigging by adding the words “which is” to read: “Bid-rigging means collusive price-fixing and anti-competitive behaviour, which is designed to unfairly influence the outcome of a competitive tender process in favour of one or more bidders.”

Moonilal questioned whether the two words “in any way significantly advance the definition,” and said even the grammar was inaccurate. He said the words should have been “which are” for accurate subject-verb agreement.

“Assuming that ‘which is’ is grammatically correct, does it advance the definition we were dealing with from the Amendment Act?

“I’m just wondering what would be the motivation of that in the circumstances that would add anything of significant value to the definition of this term.”

In response, Imbert said Moonilal should feel ashamed, as it was an Opposition senator who suggested this word choice for the amendment.

“So I’m shocked an Opposition MP is questioning the legitimacy or usefulness of words proposed on the floor in an open forum on live TV by a UNC senator. Lutchmedial, is that the lady’s name?

“And you come here carrying and wondering what’s the point. I mean, shame on you.”

And as for Moonilal’s claim the bill “scraped through” the Senate, Imbert said, “I would ask the media to educate the public with respect to reality.

“In the other place (the Senate), the government has 15 members, six Opposition members, nine independents...All that is required is a single abstention or an absence of one person.

“Not a single independent senator voted against the bill. So the margin of victory was ten votes: 16 for and six against.”

He said he saw several media reports of “rake and scrape,” and so, “I really call upon the media to present the true facts and stop misleading people.”