Peter Ramcharran
November 1 2019
Former Guyana Rice Development Board (GRDB) accountant Peter Ramcharran, who is on trial for allegedly falsifying the entity’s account, is expected to lead his defence later this month.
Ramcharran is currently being tried by Chief Magistrate Ann McLennan on five charges of falsification of an account.
The charges allege that Ramcharran, while being the accountant of the GRDB, omitted to enter a total in excess of $414 million in the GRDB ledger.
Last month, the magistrate ruled that there was sufficient evidence against Ramcharran in relation to the charges and told him to lead his defence on yesterday’s date. However, due to the unavailability of his lawyer, Sase Gunraj, who is said to be sick, Ramcharran asked for an adjournment.
The magistrate agreed to his request and told Ramcharran to ensure that his lawyer is available on the next occasion. The matter was subsequently adjourned until November 19th.
In addition to the five charges, the Chief Magistrate is also dealing with 16 misappropriation charges that are based on the allegation that Ramcharran, former GRDB General Manager Jagnarine Singh and Agricultural Consultant Madanlall Ramraj fraudulently took or applied to their own use and benefit, or for any other purpose other than the use of GRDB, over $5.1 million, between January 8th, 2010 and January 17th, 2017.
Additionally, there remain 17 charges of keeping fraudulent accounts against him based on the allegation that as a member of the GRDB, at Lot 116 to 117 Cowan Street, Kingston, he omitted or concurred in omitting from the organisation’s general ledger, entries related to a total of over $7 million in various periods between January 11th, 2010 and July 17th, 2012.
His trial on the 17 charges is expected to begin on December 17th before Magistrate Sherdel Isaacs-Marcus. The trial date was expected to commence on October 22nd but both Ramcharran and his lawyer failed to appear, which resulted in an arrest warrant being issued for him. However, on Tuesday Ramcharran made an appearance at the court and the arrest warrant was recalled.
Based on the findings of an audit, six former GRDB board members were previously charged with failing to record entries for funds amounting to over $250 million in the agency’s general ledger, from 2011 to 2015. They were Singh; Ramraj; former deputy Permanent Secretary for the Ministry of Agriculture Prema Roopnarine; Business Consultant Badrie Persaud; General Secretary of the Rice Producers Association Dharamkumar Seeraj; and PPP/C parliamentarian Nigel Dharamlall. They were all freed of the charges last month.