The adage ‘penny wise and pound foolish’ comes to mind when assessing an action by the National Drainage and Irrigation Authority (NDIA). It has been discovered that the agency spent over $2.5M to defend a court challenge where an unfairly dismissed employee was seeking damages in excess of $700,000.
This was highlighted in a forensic audit report done by Nigel Hinds Financial Services.
Auditors noted that there were several legal matters outstanding, and that Jaya Manickchand served as attorney at law representing NDIA in all legal issues and court matters for the review period.
One of the highlighted matters was Pablo Singh vs. NDIA where, “the Plaintiff claimed $754,156 for special damages. The Attorney at Law, Ms. Jaya Manickchand charged fees of G$2,500,000 for this matter. The case has been ongoing for over three years. The CEO claimed that Mr. Singh walked off the job and refused to accept a settlement.”
Kaieteur News understands that the matter has not been settled.
Singh is the field auditor who was fired for exposing wrongdoing in NDIA
In a letter to the editor, Singh said that he was accused of leaking the report of the audit he conducted to the press. He said he was also accused of conducting an audit without the CEO’s approval, breach of protocol – Reporting, security and confidentiality procedures, disclosure of information, making willful statements, unauthorised use of NDIA’s documents and records, insubordination to Permanent Secretary – Ministry of Agriculture.
Singh said that he was “illegally sent on Administrative leave on October 25th 2012 by the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture, who abrogated the functions of the CEO-NDIA, and willfully usurped the authority of the Chairman-NDIA Board of Directors who was in the process of conducting an investigation awaiting the CEO’s response thus, demonstrating poor managerial ethics and professionalism.”
Singh had sent the report to the then President, Donald Ramotar, but was refused a hearing.
He also called on Ramotar to ensure that “justice be given on this matter and should the situation remain the same, then it leaves me with no choice but to seek redress through the courts of Guyana.”
When Ramotar ignored him the second time, Singh headed to the courts.