Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) Vishnu Panday has accused government members of delaying the work of the parliamentary oversight body after four scheduled meetings were cancelled this month due to the unavailability of PPP/C representatives.
In a statement on Wednesday, Panday said the committee, which was constituted on June 15 following the September 2025 general elections, has been unable to commence substantive work because government members have not been available to attend scheduled meetings.
Panday, a Member of Parliament for the We Invest in Nationhood (WIN) party and chairman of the committee, said invitations were first sent on June 15 for a meeting on June 22. However, he said the meeting was cancelled after government members indicated they were unavailable.
According to him, subsequent meetings proposed for June 23, June 24 and June 26 also failed to proceed for the same reason.
“The Government members’ reluctance to respond positively tells that the affairs of proper governance is compromised,” Panday said.
Complied
And opposition APNU MP Ganesh Mahipaul, who also sits on the committee, supported Panday’s account, saying the chairman had complied with the Standing Orders by issuing notices of the meeting more than three working days in advance and circulating the agenda.
Mahipaul said opposition members were initially informed by the Parliament Office that the June 22 meeting would have satisfied the quorum requirement, with the chairman, two government members and two opposition members expected to attend. However, he said the opposition was later informed on the day of the meeting that the government members had withdrawn, resulting in the loss of quorum.
He said Panday subsequently proposed holding the meeting on any day between June 23 and June 26 in an effort to accommodate members, but the government side rejected each proposed date.
“As things now stand, no one knows when the PAC will meet,” Mahipaul said.
The PAC is one of Parliament’s principal oversight committees and is responsible for examining the country’s audited public accounts together with the reports of the Auditor General. Its work includes scrutinising government expenditure to ensure that public funds are spent for the purposes approved by Parliament.
The committee comprises five government members and four opposition members. However, under the Standing Orders, the quorum requires the presence of at least two government members.
Concern
Panday expressed concern that the committee is already facing delays despite a significant backlog of work. He noted that the last Auditor General’s report to be fully scrutinised by the PAC was for 2018, leaving reports from 2019 through 2024 still to be examined.
He argued that at the committee’s current pace it could take years to clear the accumulated backlog.
Mahipaul also linked the current impasse to amendments made to the Standing Orders in April 2021, when the PPP/C government changed the quorum requirements for the committee.
He contended that the changes effectively gave the government control over when the PAC could meet and, by extension, the pace at which it carried out its oversight responsibilities.
“The pattern is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore. Instead of facilitating parliamentary oversight, the Government appears intent on delaying scrutiny and frustrating accountability,” Mahipaul said.
Concerns over delays in the PAC are not new. During the previous Parliament, opposition members repeatedly complained that committee meetings were frequently cancelled because a quorum could not be achieved. Panday said committee records show that between 2021 and 2025, 51 meetings were scheduled but only 26 were held, while 25 were cancelled, mainly because government members were unavailable.
He called on the government MPs and ministers serving on the committee to attend meetings regularly so that the PAC can fulfil its constitutional oversight role.
The other members of the committee are; Gail Teixeira, Juan Edghill, Vishwa Mahadeo, Suresh Singh, Sanjeev Datadin all for the government while Nandranie Singh (WIN) and Juretha Fernandes (APNU) are the other opposition members.
Attempts to elicit a comment from the Government’s chief whip, Minister of Parliamentary Affairs Gail Teixeira proved futile.
Critics have argued that there should be no instance when at least two of the five PPP/C MPs are not available for the PAC meetings. Furthermore, considering that the PPP/C has 36 parliamentarians there should be no need for two ministers – Edghill and Teixeira – to sit on the committee.
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