Jesse Ramdeo

Se­nior Re­porter

jesse.ramdeo@cnc3.co.tt

Op­po­si­tion Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) chair­man and MP Mar­vin Gon­za­les is de­mand­ing an­swers from Gov­ern­ment min­is­ters, over what he has de­scribed as a po­ten­tial mul­ti-bil­lion-dol­lar scan­dal in­volv­ing Wi­Pay and the Na­tion­al Pay­ment and In­no­va­tion Com­pa­ny of Trinidad and To­ba­go.

Gon­za­les is ques­tion­ing the pro­cure­ment process be­hind a re­port­ed 10-year agree­ment val­ued at $4.4 bil­lion for the pro­vi­sion of dig­i­tal pay­ment ser­vices.

Speak­ing at an Op­po­si­tion me­dia con­fer­ence yes­ter­day, Gon­za­les said the Na­tion­al Pay­ment and In­no­va­tion Com­pa­ny, a State-owned en­ter­prise es­tab­lished to mod­ernise and in­te­grate gov­ern­ment pay­ments, had en­tered in­to arrange­ments with sev­er­al State agen­cies be­fore con­cerns emerged over its re­port­ed agree­ment with Wi­Pay. He said the com­pa­ny was launched in Au­gust 2025 with re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for mod­ernising, stream­lin­ing and se­cur­ing col­lec­tion and dis­burse­ment of gov­ern­ment pay­ments.

Since then, Gon­za­les said, the com­pa­ny had en­tered in­to pub­lic arrange­ments in­volv­ing agen­cies in­clud­ing the Na­tion­al Lot­ter­ies Con­trol Board (NL­CB), Unit Trust Cor­po­ra­tion (UTC), Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Ser­vices of Trinidad and To­ba­go (TSTT) and Pub­lic Trans­port Ser­vice Cor­po­ra­tion (PTSC).

Ac­cord­ing to Gon­za­les, Wi­Pay was en­gaged to de­sign the dig­i­tal plat­form in­tend­ed to in­te­grate those pay­ment ser­vices.

How­ev­er, he al­leged that the Na­tion­al Pay­ment and In­no­va­tion Com­pa­ny sub­se­quent­ly en­tered in­to a 10-year con­tract with Wi­Pay val­ued at ap­prox­i­mate­ly $4.4 bil­lion.

“Ladies and gen­tle­men, I am re­port­ing to you to­day that there is a mul­ti-bil­lion-dol­lar scan­dal now fac­ing the Gov­ern­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go with re­spect to the pro­cure­ment of Wi­Pay,” Gon­za­les said.

“We are told that the Na­tion­al Pay­ment Com­pa­ny en­tered in­to a 10-year con­tract with Wi­Pay to pro­vide these dig­i­tal ser­vices and a dig­i­tal plat­form to in­te­grate gov­ern­ment pay­ments. A 10-year con­tract and that con­tract is val­ued at $4.4 bil­lion.”

Gon­za­les al­leged that Wi­Pay was en­gaged with­out a com­pet­i­tive pro­cure­ment ex­er­cise, claim­ing the arrange­ment was a sole-se­lect con­tract.

“There was no pro­cure­ment process to en­gage Wi­Pay. It was a sole-se­lect con­tract,” he al­leged.

He called on the Min­is­ter of Fi­nance, the Min­is­ter of Plan­ning and De­vel­op­ment and the Min­is­ter of Trans­port to ex­plain the process used to en­gage the com­pa­ny.

“Was it a sole-se­lect ten­der process? Was it a se­lec­tive ten­der process? Or was it a full pub­lic ten­der process?” Gon­za­les asked.

“Tell us what was the pro­cure­ment process that you utilised to en­gage in a $4.4 bil­lion con­tract with Wi­Pay.”

Gon­za­les al­so ques­tioned who was di­rect­ing the Na­tion­al Pay­ment and In­no­va­tion Com­pa­ny be­fore a board was ap­point­ed.

He said in­for­ma­tion avail­able to the Op­po­si­tion sug­gest­ed that agree­ments had al­ready been en­tered in­to with State agen­cies be­fore the board was put in place.

The Op­po­si­tion MP ques­tioned how the com­pa­ny could have been en­ter­ing in­to sig­nif­i­cant arrange­ments dur­ing that pe­ri­od.

“Out­side of a board, who was di­rect­ing the Na­tion­al Pay­ment Com­pa­ny to en­ter in­to agree­ments with some of these ma­jor State agen­cies?” Gon­za­les asked.

He fur­ther al­leged that con­cerns about the pro­cure­ment process had re­sult­ed in the State de­cid­ing not to pro­ceed with as­pects of the re­port­ed Wi­Pay arrange­ment.

Gon­za­les claimed that Wi­Pay had since is­sued a pre-ac­tion pro­to­col let­ter and that the Gov­ern­ment was now fac­ing a po­ten­tial le­gal claim val­ued at $4.4 bil­lion.

He ques­tioned whether the board of the Na­tion­al Pay­ment and In­no­va­tion Com­pa­ny was aware of the re­port­ed con­tract when sub­se­quent agree­ments were en­tered in­to with TSTT and PTSC

“The cit­i­zens of Trinidad and To­ba­go are now fac­ing a ma­jor le­gal claim of $4.4 bil­lion,” Gon­za­les said.

He warned that the Op­po­si­tion would con­tin­ue pur­su­ing the mat­ter if the rel­e­vant min­is­ters failed to re­spond.

“We can no longer be silent on this very im­por­tant mat­ter,” he said.

“If you de­cide to re­main silent, then the Op­po­si­tion, the al­ter­na­tive gov­ern­ment in Trinidad and To­ba­go, will have more ques­tions for you.”

Guardian Me­dia con­tact­ed Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar about the al­le­ga­tions. She di­rect­ed the ques­tions to the rel­e­vant line min­is­ter.

Up to news time, Fi­nance Min­is­ter Dav­en­dranath Tan­coo had not re­spond­ed.

Guardian Me­dia al­so con­tact­ed Wi­Pay CEO Ald­wyn Wayne, but there was no re­sponse up to news time.