OPR report flags flaws in selection for HDC’s cancelled $3.4B project

Eliz­a­beth Gon­za­les

Se­nior Re­porter

eliz­a­beth.gon­za­[email protected]

The Of­fice of Pro­cure­ment Reg­u­la­tion (OPR) has found prob­lems in how the Hous­ing De­vel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion (HDC) se­lect­ed and checked com­pa­nies for its can­celled $3.4 bil­lion hous­ing project.

The find­ings are the lat­est in a se­ries of OPR in­ter­ven­tions in­volv­ing HDC pro­cure­ment, in­clud­ing com­plaints and chal­lenges over oth­er ma­jor hous­ing projects.

The one-page state­ment was pub­lished on the OPR web­site on Ju­ly 29, six weeks af­ter HDC can­celled the process.

It said: “In car­ry­ing out its in­quiry, the Of­fice re­viewed and as­sessed the Record of Pro­cure­ment Pro­ceed­ings, sup­port­ing doc­u­men­ta­tion, ex­pla­na­tions and clar­i­fi­ca­tions pro­vid­ed by the HDC, rel­e­vant da­ta from the Pro­cure­ment De­pos­i­to­ry and oth­er ver­i­fi­able records avail­able in the pub­lic do­main.”

OPR con­tin­ued: “This as­sess­ment de­tect­ed is­sues in the in­ter­pre­ta­tion and ap­pli­ca­tion of the leg­isla­tive frame­work, as well as pro­ce­dur­al gaps which gave rise to de­fi­cien­cies in com­pli­ance rel­a­tive to the pub­lic pro­cure­ment frame­work.”

It said: “In par­tic­u­lar, the Re­port iden­ti­fied short­com­ings in the process used for sup­pli­er iden­ti­fi­ca­tion and in the rigour of the due dili­gence con­duct­ed dur­ing the pre-qual­i­fi­ca­tion and eval­u­a­tion phas­es of the pro­cure­ment process.”

In sim­ple terms, OPR found prob­lems in how HDC se­lect­ed com­pa­nies and checked whether they qual­i­fied for the work.

OPR did not re­lease the full re­port. It di­rect­ed HDC to con­sid­er the find­ings and take “cor­rec­tive, re­me­di­al or com­pli­ance-re­lat­ed ac­tion” be­fore any fu­ture con­tract process.

It al­so said: “The com­plaints re­ceived in re­la­tion to the pro­cure­ment pro­ceed­ings are be­ing ad­dressed by the Of­fice sep­a­rate­ly.”

OPR added: “The Of­fice notes that the HDC has can­celled the cap­tioned pro­cure­ment ac­tiv­i­ty by No­tice of Can­cel­la­tion dat­ed June 17, 2026, and af­firms that the can­cel­la­tion is in the pub­lic in­ter­est.”

The state­ment did not al­lege cor­rup­tion, name any­one re­spon­si­ble or say a crime was com­mit­ted. A breach of a pro­cure­ment rule is not au­to­mat­i­cal­ly a crime.

Re­lat­ed com­plaints

The OPR's find­ings on the $3.4 bil­lion process sit with­in a wider record of com­plaints and pro­cure­ment chal­lenges in­volv­ing HDC, some of which re­main un­re­solved.

HDC be­gan the De­sign-Build-Fi­nance pro­gramme in 2025. Con­trac­tors were ex­pect­ed to de­sign, build and fi­nance about 3,700 homes. By De­cem­ber, HDC had list­ed Port­fo­lio 1 as lim­it­ed bid­ding in its pro­cure­ment plan.

For­mer Hous­ing Min­is­ter Camile Robin­son-Reg­is said HDC first chose 28 con­trac­tors. By ear­ly 2026, HDC had cut that group to 18 for site vis­its and bids, then se­lect­ed 11 in­tend­ed con­trac­tors.

On April 8, HDC an­nounced pro­posed awards to­talling $3,481,200,221.41. The largest, $1.025 bil­lion, was in­tend­ed for Mooti­lal Ramhit & Sons Con­tract­ing Ltd. These were pro­posed awards, not signed con­tracts. A ten-work­ing-day pe­ri­od for ob­jec­tions ran from April 9 to April 22.

HDC’s 11 in­tend­ed awards

Con­trac­tor Pro­posed award

Mooti­lal Ramhit & Sons Con­tract­ing Ltd $1.025 bil­lion

Cal­i­for­nia Stuc­co Com­pa­ny Ltd $445.8 mil­lion

Hakim Ho­sein Con­struc­tion Com­pa­ny Ltd $410.3 mil­lion

Trinidad Pro Con­struc­tion Ltd $289.6 mil­lion

Kei­th’s Trans­port and Gen­er­al Con­tract­ing Ser­vice $232.4 mil­lion

Bris­tol Con­struc­tion Com­pa­ny Ltd $229.4 mil­lion

Adam’s Project Man­age­ment & Con­struc­tion Ltd $200.8 mil­lion

Nor­ris Trans­port En­ter­pris­es Com­pa­ny Ltd $192.5 mil­lion

CE Man­age­ment and Ser­vices Ltd $183.8 mil­lion

Oil­field and In­dus­tri­al Hard­ware Ltd $159.9 mil­lion

Ram­per­sad’s Gen­er­al Con­trac­tors and Equip­ment Rental Com­pa­ny Ltd $111.9 mil­lion

On April 9, the Joint Con­sul­ta­tive Coun­cil wrote to OPR af­ter check­ing a pri­vate cit­i­zen's in­for­ma­tion. JCC pres­i­dent Fazir Khan called the is­sue “not mi­nor; this is ma­jor.”

On April 13, Robin­son-Reg­is ques­tioned the cut from 28 com­pa­nies to 18, the ex­clud­ed con­trac­tors and the fi­nal 11.

On April 14, OPR or­dered HDC to hold on the award of con­tracts. Min­is­ter in the Min­istry of Hous­ing Phillip Alexan­der de­fend­ed the process the next day. For­mer prime min­is­ter Stu­art Young al­leged “car­tel-type” be­hav­iour and called for a crim­i­nal in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

NH In­ter­na­tion­al filed 11 chal­lenges on April 21. OPR dis­missed them on April 24 be­cause the ob­jec­tions con­cerned an ear­li­er se­lec­tion stage and were filed too late. The pan­el did not de­cide whether the al­le­ga­tions were true.

HDC can­celled Port­fo­lio 1 on June 17 un­der Sec­tion 33. No con­tract had been signed. Alexan­der said the homes would be re-ten­dered and the new pro­gramme could have about 21 projects.

OPR has not dis­closed the sta­tus of the sep­a­rate com­plaints or if any were re­ferred to the Di­rec­tor of Pub­lic Pros­e­cu­tions or the po­lice.

HOW THE $3.4 BIL­LION HDC PROCESS UN­FOLD­ED

DATE WHAT HAP­PENED

2025 HDC be­gan the De­sign-Build-Fi­nance process for about 3,700 homes.

Dec 2025 Its pro­cure­ment plan list­ed Port­fo­lio 1 as lim­it­ed bid­ding.

Ear­ly 2026 Twen­ty-eight com­pa­nies were re­duced to 18 bid­ders; HDC lat­er chose 11 in­tend­ed con­trac­tors.

Apr 8 HDC an­nounced in­tend­ed awards to­talling $3.481 bil­lion.

Apr 9 The stand­still pe­ri­od be­gan and the JCC wrote to OPR.

Apr 14 OPR or­dered HDC to hold the awards while it re­viewed the process.

Apr 21–24 NH filed 11 chal­lenges; OPR dis­missed them as late.

Jun 17 HDC can­celled Port­fo­lio 1 in the pub­lic in­ter­est.

Jul 29 OPR said it found sup­pli­er-se­lec­tion and com­pa­ny-check­ing prob­lems.

Source: HDC and OPR no­tices; OPR chal­lenge de­ci­sions; back­ground sup­plied to Guardian Me­dia. Dates and re­sults are al­so stat­ed in the sto­ry.

HDC be­fore the $3.4B OPR in­ves­ti­ga­tion

A re­sponse to a Free­dom of In­for­ma­tion re­quest sent by Guardian Me­dia records an­oth­er com­plaint against HDC on Au­gust 9, 2024, for an al­leged “Breach of the Act”. OPR closed it af­ter is­su­ing a Sec­tion 14(1)(c) di­rec­tion re­quir­ing cor­rec­tive ac­tion. The en­try does not iden­ti­fy the con­tract, find­ing or HDC's re­sponse.

OPR's pub­lic reg­is­ter al­so records five HDC chal­lenges in 2024. Four con­cerned a pro­posed $475.8 mil­lion San­ta Rosa hous­ing award to Chi­na Har­bour En­gi­neer­ing.

The first ap­pli­ca­tions by NH In­ter­na­tion­al and Wood­green Con­struc­tion were dis­missed be­cause com­pa­ny doc­u­ments were miss­ing. NH filed again. On Au­gust 16, OPR sus­pend­ed the pro­cure­ment af­ter find­ing “se­ri­ous is­sues to be tried”. The pan­el ques­tioned the in­tend­ed con­trac­tor's tech­ni­cal scores, plan­ning com­pli­ance and HDC's use of a cost-per-unit mea­sure not stat­ed in the ten­der doc­u­ments.

HDC can­celled its San­ta Rosa project that day. The case end­ed with­out a fi­nal de­ci­sion be­cause NH had ob­tained the re­sult it re­quest­ed. Wood­green with­drew its case. A Class One Sys­tems CCTV chal­lenge was dis­missed.

HDC asked OPR for ad­vice on an­oth­er mat­ter. Chair­man Fer­oze Khan said it con­cerned $17,575,921.33 in in­sur­ance ser­vices re­newed in 2023 and 2024. OPR has not an­nounced an out­come.

78 mat­ters un­der probe

The wider OPR record al­so shows that the HDC mat­ter is part of a larg­er body of pro­cure­ment com­plaints.

On Feb­ru­ary 9, Guardian Me­dia's FOIA asked OPR for “a list and sum­ma­ry of all cas­es han­dled by OPR” and, for each one, “whether it was re­ferred to an­oth­er au­thor­i­ty (e.g. po­lice, DPP, In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion), and when.”

OPR sup­plied 78 named com­plaints re­ceived be­tween Ju­ly 31, 2023 and Jan­u­ary 28, 2026. Thir­ty-one end­ed with Sec­tion 14 di­rec­tions re­quir­ing the pub­lic body to cor­rect a breach. Twen­ty-two were closed for in­suf­fi­cient ev­i­dence. Eight end­ed with no ir­reg­u­lar­i­ty found, and six were out­side OPR's pow­ers.

The Ma­yaro/Rio Claro Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion ap­peared four times. One mat­ter lacked ev­i­dence, one end­ed with a di­rec­tion and two re­mained ac­tive.

The North Cen­tral Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty al­so ap­peared four times over al­leged bid rig­ging, breach­es and oth­er ir­reg­u­lar­i­ties. Three cas­es were closed and one end­ed with a di­rec­tion.

Pe­nal/Debe Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion ap­peared four times over al­leged ir­reg­u­lar­i­ties, a breach, bid rig­ging, col­lu­sion, vic­tim­i­sa­tion and co­er­cion. One mat­ter pro­duced in­ves­ti­ga­tion find­ings, one end­ed with a di­rec­tion, one lacked ev­i­dence and one was out­side OPR's pow­ers.

NIPDEC, WASA, PLIPDE­CO and the Min­istry of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty each ap­peared three times. Their com­plaints al­leged breach­es, bid rig­ging, col­lu­sion or oth­er ir­reg­u­lar­i­ties. Out­comes in­clud­ed di­rec­tions, in­suf­fi­cient ev­i­dence, no ir­reg­u­lar­i­ty and find­ings af­ter an in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

Five com­plaints reached the stage where OPR is­sued re­sults and rec­om­men­da­tions af­ter an in­ves­ti­ga­tion. They in­volved PTSC, NIPDEC, the Agri­cul­tur­al De­vel­op­ment Bank, Pe­nal/Debe Re­gion­al Cor­po­ra­tion and Giza Con­struc­tion.

The ap­pen­dix col­umn head­ed “Sta­tus, Find­ings, Rec­om­men­da­tions, Re­fer­rals” did not name a re­port to the DPP, po­lice or In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion. The records do not es­tab­lish whether a con­fi­den­tial re­port was made; none was iden­ti­fied.

The 78 en­tries are not OPR's full com­plaint count. The ap­pen­dix al­so said 37 mat­ters were on­go­ing but did not say whether they over­lapped the named en­tries.

On Au­gust 13, 2025, OPR's on­line fig­ures showed 55 open and 73 closed com­plaints, a to­tal of 128. It al­so list­ed 39 in­ves­ti­ga­tions. A com­plaint may be­come an in­ves­ti­ga­tion, so those fig­ures could be con­sid­ered.

Sec­tion 14 of the Pub­lic Pro­cure­ment and Dis­pos­al of Pub­lic Prop­er­ty Act, 2015 (Act No. 1 of 2015, as amend­ed) in Trinidad and To­ba­go al­lows the OPR to di­rect a pub­lic body to fol­low the Act. Fail­ure to obey with­out a rea­son­able ex­cuse is an of­fence car­ry­ing a $100,000 fine. Sec­tion 44 re­quires OPR to give its find­ings af­ter an in­ves­ti­ga­tion and make rec­om­men­da­tions.

Un­der Sec­tion 45, OPR must re­port a mat­ter to the DPP when it has rea­son­able grounds to sus­pect an of­fence. The DPP de­cides whether po­lice should in­ves­ti­gate and whether charges should be brought.

An in­formed source said an al­le­ga­tion need not be proved be­fore OPR be­gins an in­ves­ti­ga­tion, but it must have enough cred­i­ble in­for­ma­tion. If the in­quiry points to wrong­do­ing, the pub­lic body must be told and al­lowed to re­spond.

“Once it goes to the DPP, the DPP takes it over from there and it's out of the hands of the OPR,” the source said.

The source said he was un­aware of any OPR mat­ter reach­ing the DPP. He said pub­lic chal­lenge cas­es have stopped con­tracts and forced new ten­ders.

“OPR has been set up for a lot more than just pure in­ves­ti­ga­tion,” the source said. But he said the first court case would test the en­force­ment sys­tem: “It will just take the first one to get it go­ing.”

In the To­ba­go Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty's $18 mil­lion am­bu­lance mat­ter, OPR be­gan an in­quiry in Oc­to­ber 2025 af­ter a com­plaint by then THA Mi­nor­i­ty Leader Kelvon Mor­ris. The po­lice in­quiry be­gan af­ter Mor­ris sep­a­rate­ly wrote to the act­ing Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er and the An­ti-Cor­rup­tion In­ves­ti­ga­tions Bu­reau in June. No pub­lic record shows an OPR re­fer­ral.

Eight com­plaints in the FOIA list had not been re­solved. One against the De­posit In­sur­ance Cor­po­ra­tion had been await­ing ex­ter­nal le­gal ad­vice for 769 days when OPR re­spond­ed on March 26. The record does not say what the com­plaint al­leged.

OPR re­fused to re­lease its com­pli­ance, mon­i­tor­ing and as­sess­ment re­ports. It said dis­clo­sure could “po­ten­tial­ly com­pro­mise the OPR's on­go­ing in­ves­ti­ga­tions” and re­veal its meth­ods.

The HDC in­quiry has end­ed. Its full find­ings re­main un­pub­lished, and OPR has not dis­closed whether it con­sid­ered Sec­tion 45.

Guardian Me­dia has made sev­er­al at­tempts since June to get a com­ment from OPR of­fi­cials via email, calls to its chair­man and Pro­cure­ment Reg­u­la­tor Bev­er­ly Khan and What­sApp mes­sages. All at­tempts have been fu­tile on this mat­ter.