No official was ever held accountable
for these scams
Dear Editor,
In 2011 the Ministry of Finance uncovered a multimillion dollar fraud conservatively believed to be in excess $196M in the Accountant General’s office. The fraud involved some 75 fraudulent cheques issued to 56 beneficiaries under the pretext of being payments for superannuation benefits. This massive fraud involved blatant breaches of existing controls with the Ministry. At the time of the fraud, the most senior functionary after the Ministers was never held accountable for the breaches in the systems and was not even suspended while the investigation was going on.
The official was also a top man in the Ministry when there was a racket involving loan advances paid to staff. These advances were used to run a car purchasing ring within the Ministry with many senior members of the ministry giving monies to an individual to invest in the importation of vehicles. The individual who was also a staff member in the Ministry subsequently absconded to Canada without repaying those whom had invested in his Ponzi Scheme, including those who had abused the system of advances. This scheme was hushed up and no one was ever disciplined for the abuse of the system of loan advances.
In 2003 and 2004 there was a massive re-migrant scam in which some 86 duty free letters were signed by the Secretary to the Treasury, granting millions of dollars in tax concessions to persons who later turned out not to be eligible for the concession. This remains the largest financial scam ever perpetuated within any Ministry in Guyana. Initially there were denials that any bogus letters were signed but later it was confirmed that the Secretary to the Treasury did sign the letters. It was only after intense public pressure was applied that the government decided to send him home on leave pending the outcome of the investigation. In then end two clerks from the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs were charged but Rekha escaped scot free, even though he was expected, as the officer signing off on the concessions, to thoroughly scrutinise the applications to ensure that there is nothing fraudulent about them. He did not exercise due diligence and because of this failing, the government lost hundreds of millions of dollars, most of which have not been recovered.
Vibert Bholanauth