A city businessman has told Stabroek Business that the rise in the practices of smuggling and money laundering in the commercial sector is making it increasingly difficult for legitimate businesses in the country’s wholesale and retail sectors to survive. And while he says that local private sector organizations ought to “speak our against these practices” he told this newspaper that he is not optimistic that either the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce or the Private Sector Commission will take a stand against these practices. “The truth is that they are intimidated by what is happening around them.”
According to the businessman the private sector can no longer pretend that money-laundering has not become commonplace in Guyana. “The problem is that those businessmen in the wholesale and retail trade whose trading activities involve high overheads, including, as of January this year, VAT and Excise taxes, cannot compete with those persons who can trade at much lower prices because they are in the business of money laundering.”
And the businessman asserts that while it is not “all that difficult” to detect some cases of money laundering, “it really is a matter of the will of the authorities” to remove the practice.
He told Stabroek Business that where it seemed that the authorities were indifferent to the practice it was up to local private sector bodies to speak out against the practice. “I believe that if the right noises are made and are made consistently enough, it will help to place pressure on the authorities to do something about the problem.”
Asked to comment on recent media reports that businessmen had been linked to the recent discovery of a burnt out aircraft at an airstrip in Berbice the businessman said that inability of the law enforcement agencies to effectively police activities across the country and to detect illegal activities “makes just about anything possible.” And while he conceded that he had no “hard information” on the aircraft find he said that it was “more than likely that the plane was linked to some illegal activity.”
According to the source it has now become necessary for the media to rethink the way in which the word “businessman” is used. He said that the current standard media definition for a businessman appeared to be “anyone engaged in any activity from which they were earning money.” He said that he believed that the legitimacy of the activity from which money was being earned ought to form part of the criteria for defining the word “businessman.’ “Some people may say that very often it is difficult to tell. I do not accept that. I believe that in most cases it it relatively easy to determine, in a general sense, who the legitimate businessmen are in this country.”
The businessman who spoke with Stabroek Business at his request said that even though he was concerned about being publicly identified, he believed that illegal activities had “blighted and warped” the Guyana economy to a point where some conventional businessmen were despairing of the situation ever improving. “I am aware that we still have businessmen in Guyana whose only wish is to provide consumers with goods and services for a fair profit. The problem is that they face unfair competition and they do not believe that the situation will change easily.”
The businessman told Stabroek Business that he believed that this year had seen “a considerable increase” in the smuggling of food and other consumer items across Guyana’s borders with Brazil, Venezuela and Suriname. He made particular reference to flour which he told Stabroek Business was being smuggled into Guyana in conditions that not only evaded the taxes paid at legitimate ports of entry but may also pose health risks in view of the conditions under which the commodity is sometimes brought into the country.
He said that he was aware of recent cases in which flour was illegally imported into Guyana “in conditions under which it was very possible that the flour may have become con-taminated.”
And the businessman feels that despite the “practical difficulties” associated with monitoring the movement of goods across the country’s borders, more can be done to try to stamp out smuggling.
He pointed out that after goods are moved across the borders, much of it has to be transported to the coast. “Since large quantities of an item like flour and other commodities that are imported illegally in large quantities cannot be transported discreetly over a long period of time, then you have to accept that more rigorous policing, including a reliable intelligence network can help in the fight against smuggling.”
The businessman said that it was not to the credit of the government that more was not being done to strengthen the local monitoring agencies, including the Food and Drugs Department. He said that the stories that had appeared in the media recently suggested that while there were growing international concerns about the proliferation of counterfeit drugs, there was not evidence that the capacity of the Food and Drugs Department to effectively monitor fake drug imports was being enhanced.
The businessman told Stabroek Business that he believes that local private sector bodies must adopt an agenda that is more responsive to the currents in the business community. He said that while he was aware that groups of businessmen meet socially and discuss common concerns, it appeared that they were only prepared “to make certain observations among their trusted friends.”
