Massive corruption uncovered at CJIA
Corruption is said to be a disease that eats away at the faith of citizens in its government and when it is reported and there is inaction it is even more despicable.
Officials are now talking about a racket at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA). Despite numerous reports to superiors, the racket is not investigated and is, in fact, covered up.
The Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) is responsible for the collection of all taxes payable to Government. It also runs an Internal Affairs and Intelligence and Risk Management department.
There is, further, a monitoring section which operates at wharves and airports.
According to reports, a very senior officer (name provided) in the monitoring section at the airport has been colluding with security officers and immigration officials to recycle airport tax stubs, as well as allow for drugs and other items to be placed on planes destined for foreign locations.
In the case of the recycled stubs, these are then resold to travelling passengers.
The publication was told that the official would stop the cameras from recording or delete footage altogether, in order to allow these dealings to go unrecorded.
This publication was informed that the cameras at the airport are very unreliable and would become non functional after a bout of heavy rains among other reasons.
Whenever questioned about missing footage the fact that the system is unreliable is used as the excuse.
The crooked GRA officer who facilitates this was also accused of doing the same when he was posted at a city wharf where containers are searched.
Corrupt businessmen would usually make a payment to ensure that their containers are not thoroughly searched and the GRA monitoring officer would record the opening of the container after which a series of technical ploys would be used to cover up the fact that the containers are not properly searched.
According to reports, despite the activities being reported, the officer was transferred to the Airport and was subsequently promoted.
This publication was told that the reason the activities are not thoroughly investigated and forwarded to the Commissioner General is the fact that the corrupt officer and the persons required to investigate, share a close relationship.