The level and value of governmental procurement has escalated to such a height that, having regard to Guyana’s ethnic diversity, an entrenched, law-based, programme of supplier diversity is rapidly becoming a necessity. Such progammes do not exist in developing countries such as Guyana. But it exists in many developed countries in North America and Europe. The United States, which has had a long history of discrimination against African Americans and other groups, such as American Indians, as well as an equally long history of resistance to such discrimination has, as a consequence, developed advanced programmes of supplier diversity. These policies generally exist in large companies, but the Federal Government and many State Governments have also passed laws which provide for supplier diversity in their own procurement practices. In Guyana’s context, supplier diversity includes infrastructure and procurement of goods and services.
In Guyana’s past, supplier diversity was not an issue because State and private procurement were too modest to be of financial consequence to the business community, even though there have always been complaints about corruption. However, the restoration of democracy coincided with the resolution of Guyana’s debt crisis in the early 1990s. This resulted in a large inflow of resources from the Inter-American Development Bank, the World Bank and other financial institutions and the restoration of economic growth both of which led to an exponential increase in Government spending in both infrastructure development and procurement of goods and services. This situation gave rise to two developments, namely, accusations of corruption and of discrimination. Both were stoutly denied but the accusations persisted.
The demands to reform the procurement system, while it led to modest changes, were largely resisted. The visible signs of corruption eventually became so gross that the Constitution Reform Commission was forced to recommend the establishment of a Procurement Commission in the Constitution, which is not really the place for such a Commission. But governmental resistance to the reform of the procurement system led to the proposal. And even though the Constitution was amended to provide for the Procurement Commission in 2001, the Government resisted the appointment of the Commission. The resistance to the Procurement Commission was so deeply entrenched that the 2011 PPP/C Government sacrificed its life instead of appointing it. The AFC undertook to withdraw its motion of no confidence in 2014 if the Procurement Commission were appointed. The government refused and called elections instead. It was the APNU+AFC government that fulfilled the constitutional responsibility of appointing the Procurement Commission after it came to office in 2015. The procurement system that now exists still allows high volume complaints to be made. There is a complaint about one company being awarded a contract for the supply of $7B in drugs and another about a company formed less than one year ago being awarded the multi-billion US dollar contract for the Wales project.
Almost from the day the PPP/C government took office charges of discrimination began to emerge. The politicization of the discrimination issue has become so intense that it is now alleged that apartheid exists in Guyana. But there is no doubt that Indian Guyanese were better positioned to take advantage of the vastly expanding procurement activity of the government. Indian, Portuguese and Chinese Guyanese have traditionally dominated the business sector and African Guyanese have traditionally dominated the administrative and professional sectors. Portuguese, Chinese and some Indian Guyanese largely migrated in the 1960s. In the 1970s-1990s the remaining Indian Guyanese continued in the business sector although many joined the professions, while African Guyanese filled the burgeoning state and administrative sectors which then controlled 80-90 percent of the economy.
When the private sector opened up in the early 1990s African Guyanese were the least positioned to take advantage of the growing procurement industry. Worse, they bore the major brunt of the IMF dictated reduction of the state administrative and bureaucratic business sectors. Up to the present time an African Guyanese business sector of any significant size has not emerged. African Guyanese are not the only sector that would benefit from supplier diversity. Amerindian Guyanese, women and other sectors would benefit. It is in the interest of Guyana that all sectors of the populations, regardless of their history, capacity or location, have or are given the opportunity to participate in all business, procurement and supplier activity if they so wish. It is the duty and responsibility of the State to facilitate by legal and material means the equitable allocation of opportunity
Occasionally, groups of African Guyanese business people would be seen meeting with government officials, presumably to press their case for a larger share of procurement. But there have been no demands for a structured approach, even for a law-based system, to ensure supplier diversity. This has been achieved in other countries without compromising standards. It can be achieved in Guyana if the argument is made. And the end of corruption in procurement will break down the resistance to, and facilitate, supplier diversity. So that they are two sides of the same coin. The experience with the decade and a half resistance to the establishment of the Procurement Commission indicates that supplier diversity will encounter equal resistance. This should be no reason not to press the case.