Files resurface, flood theory recedes

QUESTIONS surrounding missing procurement records at the University Hospital of the West Indies (UHWI) deepened on Tuesday after acting Chief Executive Officer Eric Hosin told Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) that eight additional contract files valued at roughly $65 million had been discovered in storage areas that were previously searched.

He also revealed that four procurement files valued at $35 million had been reconstructed, bringing the total number of previously missing files that have now been accounted for to 46 of the 51 contracts identified by the auditor general.

The disclosure came during the PAC’s continuing examination of the auditor general’s report into procurement practices at UHWI, which had earlier identified widespread gaps in documentation and major weaknesses in the hospital’s records management systems.

Providing an update to the committee, Hosin revealed that the additional files were uncovered after staff were instructed to continue searching areas that had already been examined during the audit process.

PAC Chairman Julian Robinson immediately sought clarification on where the files had been discovered, given that earlier searches had reportedly failed to locate them.

Hosin told the committee that the additional files were found in storage rooms that had already undergone searches during earlier efforts to locate the missing records.

“We continued the search and we found eight more files… one of those files was found yesterday,” he said, while explaining that the records were discovered in locked storage areas used by the hospital.

The revelation immediately prompted concern from committee members, particularly given that the same locations had previously been examined.

Robinson questioned how documents tied to millions of dollars in public contracts could suddenly emerge after repeated searches had reportedly failed to locate them.

The issue has become one of the central controversies flowing from the audit after earlier explanations linked some of the missing files to flooding incidents at the hospital.

That explanation first surfaced during the PAC’s March 31 sitting when former senior director of procurement at UHWI, Ainsworth Buckeridge, suggested that flooding may have contributed to the loss or damage of procurement records stored in lower sections of the hospital.

However, Tuesday’s disclosures appeared to further distance the hospital from the notion that flooding was responsible for the disappearance of the files.

Instead, Hosin indicated that the issue was more closely tied to disorganised storage practices and long-standing weaknesses in records management.

Additionally the acting CEO told members that despite the progress made in locating documents, several procurement files remain beyond recovery.

“We also have identified, in terms of files we cannot locate and we are unable to reconstruct, about five files for $54 million. We’re just not able to find any documentation that would provide us with information to reconstruct a procurement file…So we have the information from finance, but in terms of having enough to produce a procurement file, we just don’t have that,” Hosin added.

Hosin also disclosed that six of the contracts initially identified as missing — valued at approximately $109.1 million — had ultimately been cancelled and, therefore, did not proceed to implementation.

The PAC also turned its attention to the security arrangements surrounding the storage area where the procurement files were kept amid concerns about how records tied to millions of dollars in public contracts could repeatedly evade detection.

Robinson questioned whether proper controls existed over access to the records room and whether any employee could enter the area.

Responding on behalf of the hospital, Senior Director of Public Procurement Ainsworth Buckeridge explained that the room is secured by key access controlled through the procurement administrator.

As scrutiny intensified, Robinson called on the Auditor General’s Department to independently vet the hospital’s claims regarding the newly recovered files.

“What I would ask the auditor general’s team to do is just to verify the information being provided by the hospital, and for you to be able to indicate to us that you have sight of those 46 files now, because we started off, I think, with 22 of the 51,” he said.