Months after the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) agreed to merge the Auditor General Reports for 2019 and 2020, People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Member of Parliament, Sanjeev Datadin has filed a motion for the reports to be scrutinized separately but already, it has not secured the support of the Chairman of the PAC, Jermaine Figueira.

“I hereby move a motion that the Annual Auditor General Reports for the years 2019 and 2020 be examined and scrutinized separately and sequentially by the Public Accounts Commission,” a section of the motion read.

The motion was submitted to the Chairman of the PAC, Jermaine Figueira; Clerk of the National Assembly, Sherlock Isaacs; and Clerk of the PAC, Savitah D’Andrade on Monday, November 14. It was seconded by Minister of Public Works, Juan Edghill, MP.

Laying the foundation for the motion, MP Datadin submitted that Government’s expenditure for 2019 and 2020 was “without parliamentary oversight and budgetary debates” until September 2020.

It was explained that public expenditure, during the specified period, occurred after the No-Confidence Motion, and in the absence of the sitting of the National Assembly. 

But the PAC Chairman told News Source on Tuesday that the motion in its present construct will not be accepted whenever it is put to the committee.

“The sole aim of this motion is to rescind a motion that was put and accepted by the committee for the merging of the years 2019 and 2020 reports – an action that was done by several chairmen before this committee,” MP Figueira said.

The PAC Chairman argued that merging of reports took place under the chairmanship of former Member of Parliament, Carl Greenidge, and even under the chairmanship of President Irfaan Ali, when he chaired the PAC.

He said in cases where reports are merged, PAC members are given the opportunity to scrutinize those reports without hindrances. 

“The PAC has never prevented or denied any member the opportunity to ask any amount of questions in their scrutiny of the Auditor General’s report findings, so I find the reason in this motion most absurd, ridiculous and of no relevance by the learned member who is proposing this motion,” the PAC Chairman said.

He is convinced that the motion is intended to further stall the work of the PAC.

“It very clear and it reinforces our stated position that the government is not desirous nor is it interested in scrutiny of their years and it is bent on stymieing the work of the PAC with these obstructionist tactics,” he told News Source.

He added: “If one is to have a casual glance of the 2021 report findings then they will appreciate what we have been saying and will understand why the government is taking this obstructionist approach to prevent the PAC from doing its work with the tyranny of their one seat majority.”

Related posts:

Government uses majority to get PAC to scrutinize 2019 and 2020 Auditor General reports separately Government and Opposition clash over work of Public Accounts Committee; Chairman calls out Government for boycotting committee meetings Government’s absence forces another cancellation of PAC meeting Public Accounts Committee to meet twice weekly to clear backlog