Opposition Senator Allan Bernard is questioning the Government’s decision to exempt the $26-billion Pedro Plains Irrigation Expansion Project from public procurement rules by designating it a national development project.
Bernard raised the concern last Friday in the Senate during the debate on the Public Procurement (National Development Project) (Pedro Plains Irrigation Expansion Project) Order, 2026, which was affirmed by the Upper House.
In his contribution, Bernard pressed the Government on whether alternative procedures, including narrower exemptions, had been considered. He also wanted to know how much time the proposed approach would save.
“What independent analysis shows that the expected benefits outweigh the risk to competition, cost control, and accountability?” he further questioned.
Bernard said the Opposition was not against the irrigation project, but was compelled to ask “simple transparency and accountability questions”.
“And speed is not a sufficient answer, as delays may legitimately arise from an incomplete design, from financing, from land acquisition, from environmental approvals, weak coordination or implementation capacity,” he said.
The opposition senator argued that the administration had an obligation to produce evidence that procurement was an obstacle to the project, rather than simply suggesting that oversight rules were slowing development.
He cautioned that if every major project could be exempted because it was important or urgent, the procurement law risked becoming less relevant in areas involving the greatest public expenditure and financial exposure.
Government Senator Dr Dana Morris Dixon defended the decision to exempt the project from the Procurement Act, saying years of technical work had been undertaken with support from Jamaica’s international partners.
According to Morris Dixon, the technical work had established the project’s scope and demonstrated value for money.
She said the contractors would be made public, adding that the Government had an obligation to disclose their names.
Morris Dixon also pointed to recent criticism from Opposition Leader Mark Golding that the Government had failed to execute capital projects, resulting in allocated funds having to be returned to the Consolidated Fund.
“One of the things that came up – and if you go back to the presentations and you listen – there was, across the aisle, consensus that we had to look at procurement and that our procurement rules were stymieing the development of our country and we weren’t able to execute on them,” she said.
Morris Dixon said the Government had decided to designate the Pedro Plains Irrigation Expansion Project as a national project, exempting it from the procurement rules.
However, she stressed that the project would remain subject to oversight by agencies such as the Auditor General’s Department and the Integrity Commission.
She added that Parliament’s Public Administration and Appropriations Committee could also exercise oversight by inviting the principals of the ministry responsible for the project to answer questions.
edmond.campbell@gleanerjm.com
