Masjid mulls legal action against GRA
Members of the Meten-Meer-Zorg, West Coast Demerara masjid are considering taking legal action against the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) for its continued granting of liquor licences to a business opposite it, despite a court order preventing this.
The issue over a liquor bar operating close to the mosque has been a recurring theme since 2005, and Halim Khan, an executive member of the masjid said the situation had become intolerable. He told Stabroek News in an interview on Tuesday that since 2005 when the issue first surfaced the mosque’s executive had sought the intervention of several top officials and moved to the High Court. Although an injunction was granted preventing the sale of liquor at the Lot 48 Meten-Meer-Zorg, Public Road address, the GRA recently approved a licence for someone else.
Khan recalled that in March 2005, the masjid wrote to the then Commissioner of Customs Trade Administration (CTA) Lambert Marks objecting to the operation of any liquor restaurant or beer garden opposite the mosque. Khan said copies of the letter were also sent to GRA Commissioner-General Khurshid Sattaur, the Regional Executive Officer of Region Three, the Central Housing and Planning Authority (CHPA) and the Com-mander of the Guyana Police Force’s ‘D’ Division.
Members of the masjid had taken this step after receiving information that businessman, Premnauth Persaud, was moving to establish a beer garden in the area. Khan said Persaud then applied to the CTA for a licence and this was granted on July 12, even before the businessman had applied to the CHPA for approval to his plan. However, CTA instructed that there should be no sale of alcoholic beverages at the location. According to documents seen by this newspaper, Persaud applied to the CHPA on September 19, 2005. He was given permission to sell food. Stabroek News was shown a copy of the letter from the CHPA dated 31 October, 2005. The letter also stated that the development should at no time be a nuisance to the neighbourhood and there should be neither sale nor consumption of alcoholic beverages there. Khan said notwithstanding the instructions from both the CTA and CHPA, the businessman sold liquor at the outlet and this forced the masjid to file an injunction in the High Court on 17 November, 2005 seeking the prevention of the sale of alcohol at the business place.
Justice Claudette La Bennett granted the order to the masjid. Following this, Khan said, the masjid informed the CTA and all the other agencies of the court’s decision and the revenue body even undertook to ensure that no one was given liquor licences to operate at that address. In August 22, the matter came up again in court and Justice Jainarayan Singh ruled that injunction should run its course. Following this ruling, the business closed its doors, but last year October, a licence was issued to Harry Singh to operate a liquor bar at the same address. Khan said that on realising this, the masjid again raised the issue with the revenue body, but has since received a royal runaround. He said to date no one from the CTA has visited the location to look into the matter and when he queried he was told that the department had no staff to send during the hours when the business place was usually open. According to information the bar opens at 5 pm.
Noting that someone was behind the issuance of the licence with the knowledge of the court injunction, Khan said he could not understand the double standards of the revenue authority. He said he had taken the issue up with President Bharrat Jagdeo, but has received no positive response.
Khan said the masjid’s activities included trying to keep children off the streets and away from drugs, but all of their efforts were being undermined by a rum shop sitting just opposite the place of worship. He recalled that only recently two men, on leaving the rum shop in a drunken state, urinated on the masjid’s fence while two others vandalised the masjid’s windows. He said there were also attempts to break into the building.
“We want to worship in peace and with the kind of sanctity that would allow for spiritual growth,” Khan said. He said the CTA and other bodies responsible for granting licences to liquor restaurants must ensure that the business place seeking permission was not close to places of worship. The Meten-Meer-Zorg masjid has approximately 200 members.
