Deputy chairman of the Procurement Regulation board, James Chang Kit, has resigned with immediate effect.
And, he is blaming government’s changes to the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Property Act, 2015 as a reason, stating that it was the “final emasculation.”
Chang Kint said: “The two prior amendments in 2016 and 2017 had an initial damaging effect on the recruitment process for a Regulator and the operation of the parent Act and signalled the Government’s reluctance for proper procurement oversight.”
“The subsequent stalling and stymying of our efforts to have the necessary Regulations proclaimed as we went through the many challenges to our jurisdiction, interminable reviews and subtle attacks brought on by the Government via its agents in state enterprises, Minister of Finance and Attorney General both subtle and frontal, underwrote its reluctance for proper oversight of its spending,” he stated.
Chang Kit said the “relative silence and acquiescence of the society and some members of our Board in accepting this sorry state of affairs in a fast dwindling and bankrupt economy” had driven him to despair.
The latest amendment to the Public Procurement and Disposal of Public Property Act was assented to by President Paula-Mae Weekes on December 27, 2020.
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