Make most of your moment, Mr Paulwell - Embattled energy minister to open Sectoral Debate tomorrow
Published:Monday | May 5, 2014 | 12:00 AM
Beaten, stoned and left in the broiling sun to fight for his political life, Phillip Paulwell will tomorrow open the 'grand waste of time debate' in the House of Representatives, hoping that Jamaicans will believe him when he says he is not to be blamed for the baseload energy crisis facing the country.
The debate, eloquently referred to as the Sectoral Debate, offers all members of parliament the opportunity to speak about anything they wish. Paulwell, buoyed by a show of support from his backers at a People's National Party meeting yesterday, no doubt will use his presentation to go on the offensive, especially in light of calls for him to resign and the project to be removed from his portfolio.
One would be surprised if Paulwell fails to make the point that the inclusion of Energy World International (EWI) in the process, despite having missed the deadline for proposal, was a decision of the Cabinet and not his.
In fact, it would be surprising if Paulwell does not chronicle the events in such a way that the impression is given that he did not meddle in the process and that he had nothing to do with EWI's late proposal being considered by the Office of Utilities Regulation (OUR).
By now, all Jamaicans should know that the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) has swallowed the report of the contractor general, which concluded that the process of considering bidders for the project was flawed and that EWI was given an unfair advantage. In fact, that was the basis for the IDB denying a request for a loan to finance 70 per cent of the project.
No OUR response yet
It is quite disappointing that the Office of the Contractor General has refused to respond to the point-by-point rebuttal of its findings, which was offered by the OUR after the report was made public.
The OUR has said the contractor general erred when he arrived at these conclusions/findings because he failed to properly apply the provisions of the procurement regulations and the procurement handbook.
The OUR maintains that the contractor general's conclusions in this regard are completely erroneous and predicated on the unlawful application of a procurement procedure applicable to consulting services.
The OUR and the Cabinet did the country a disservice by not rushing to court to get a judicial declaration on the matter. It is not too late for this shower of rain. Both the OUR and the contractor general cannot be correct; and if the contractor general is right, it raises serious questions about the legal advice being given to the Cabinet, which asked the OUR to examine EWI's proposal.
Paulwell, when he speaks, must be unequivocal about the licence that has been issued to EWI. Jamaica needs to know for sure whether the proposed licence, which was made public by the OUR, is indeed the one on which the entities entered their bid for the baseload project.
Outside of the EWI-related issue, Paulwell would be most disrespectful if he speaks and does not touch on other critical matters for which he has made grand announcements and there has been little progress.
I speak, for example, of the rare-earth mineral project; the commissioning of a coal plant at Ewarton, St Catherine, which would return to full production; and the reopening of the refineries at Alpart and Kirkvine by 2015.
Taxation, representation
On another note, we see where opposition Senator Marlene Malahoo Forte wants to throw out the established principle of no taxation without representation. She wants the Senate to be able to amend, or even vote down, money bills such as the Estimates of Expenditure after they have been approved by the people's representatives.
One has to sympathise with the senator, especially when one considers that her contribution to the debate on the Appropriations Bill in the Senate last Friday came at the back end of some pitiful presentations, especially from Robert Montague and Lambert Brown. She just had to join the line.
Unfortunately, Malahoo Forte appeared not to have taken into consideration that the Senate is made up of non-elected members and that her suggestion has grave implications for democracy, particularly if persons rejected by the majority of the voters are given licence to impose taxation on the masses or to chop and change the Budget as they wish.
While the Senate is a review chamber, there must always be limits on what persons, hand-picked by the prime minister and the leader of the opposition, should be able to do.