State Asset Recovery Unit  receives numerous complaints  of stolen gov’t. property

By: Kiana Wilburg Head of the State Asset Recovery Unit, Dr. Clive Thomas said that those who held authority over state assets under the previous administration will be subject to “rigourous” audits, preparations for which are already underway. The Economist said that this comes in light of the “hundreds upon hundreds of complaints” that come in on a daily basis to the Asset Recovery Unit regarding individuals who held high office and abused or allegedly stole state assets. Dr. Thomas said that by all legal means necessary, his entity’s mandate to return or regain what rightfully belongs to the state, will be achieved. Dr. Thomas noted that under the previous regime, the assets of the state were “misused and in some cases stolen in unconscionable ways.” He said that he will make it his duty to see that due process is followed and that justice is served. The Head of the Asset Recovery Unit stated, “I cannot begin to tell you the amount of complaints we get on a daily basis on persons under the previous government who abused assets of the state and in some cases, the evidence would strongly suggest that they stole it for their own benefit or the benefit of a third party. So we have our job cut out for us.” He noted however that in order for this to be done, the entity must be legally empowered to prosecute and this comes from having its own legislation.

Head of the State Asset Recovery Unit, Professor, Clive Thomas

Dr. Thomas said that the coalition Government is making moves in this regard as it is currently preparing a “robust piece of legislation” that promises more than moral suasion with respect to stamping out corruption and prosecuting those who dared to steal the assets of the state. Dr. Thomas explained that the draft legislation is currently in the chambers of the Ministry of Legal Affairs. It is expected to be perused and strengthened by a specialist from the United Kingdom before being taken to the National Assembly for passage. Dr. Thomas said that once it receives the blessings of the House and the assent of President David Granger, the entity will be renamed the State Asset Recovery Agency and it will be vested with more powers. As for the process of strengthening the draft legislation, the Economist said that the Asset Recovery Unit is awaiting the presence of Mr. Brian Horne who he said is an exceptional advisor on asset recovery. Dr. Thomas asserted that Mr. Horne, who is a Guyanese by birth, has spent most of his life in the United Kingdom. He has worked in more than 22 countries in the field of the recovery of state assets and the successful prosecution of the defaulters. Already, a number of cases have been undertaken by the State Assets Recovery Unit one of which includes the misappropriation of state assets by former GuySuCo CEO, Dr. Rajendra Singh. Dr. Thomas had said that a request was made for more details for some of the transactions and decisions made by Dr. Singh as they involved the misuse of State assets. The Assets Recovery Unit will be looking into the sale of 2.6792 acres of land at Plantation Good Hope, East Coast Demerara to one Kelvin Gobin. This sale was authorized by Dr. Singh. Dr. Singh, during his tenure as GuySuCo’s CEO, also entered into management agreements with Global Casetech and Global Cane Sugar Services out of India for the management services on a number of estates at unreasonably high cost, and without approval of the Board of Directors. Documents also show that he persisted with a commercial bio fertilizer despite advice to the contrary from the corporation’s research and technical personnel.  Single sourced procurements were done for the supply of bio fertilizers from Kay Bovet Engineering Ltd. of India in the sum of US$76,680 in June 2014 and Global Cane Sugar Services Pvt. Ltd of India in the sum of US$68,580 in February 2015. Despite being cautioned numerous times regarding the adaptation of a practice that has not been used outside of India, the former CEO persisted with commercial application rather than a trial as advised.  Dr. Singh also made decisions that resulted in millions of dollars being lost by GuySuCo. The said documents reveal that Singh had responsibility for Finance and Marketing for the company and entered into a one year agreement with Tate and Lyle in 2013 when the company could have entered into one for three years while locking in at a higher sugar price for 2014 and 2015. This was the first time in the history of the Long Term Agreement (LTA) with Tate and Lyle that a one-year agreement was entered into. The failure to enter into a three-year agreement resulted in a conservatively estimated loss of US$60M in revenue for the corporation for the years 2014 and 2015. During his time as CEO, he also committed 38,000 tonnes of sugar to Futures Market without locking into a price of $0.16 cents per pound. The current price is now US$0.11 cents per pound and this decline resulted in a loss of revenue in the sum of US$4.2M for GuySuCo.