News of the recent arrest of three Guyanese ? Isaac Sarjoo, Richard Sarjoo and Roy Arjune ? in Suriname with approximately 35 pounds of gold said to be worth about US$500,000, seemed so commonplace that it hardly caused a stir in legal, financial or political circles.
Dr Roger Luncheon, who is Chairman of the Central Intelligence Committee along with his substantive appointments as Secretary of the Guyana Defence Board, Head of the Presidential Secretariat and Secretary to the Cabinet, had no compunction about admitting to the media that it was almost “common knowledge that gold is being smuggled to Suriname from Guyana.” Unable or unwilling to undertake a more profound analysis of the crime, Dr Luncheon seemed satisfied to say simply that the three men will have to give an account of what transpired.
Much more than the culprits’ account of what transpired will be needed if the scourge of smuggling is ever to be extirpated. Not only was that arrest rare but it is only a minuscule part of the labyrinthine web of the contraband criminal culture that has been spawned over the past decade. Organised crime has become a huge complex that encompasses a variety of contraband activities. The new millennium displaced the traditional trafficking in a low-value variety of foodstuff, household utensils and electronic equipment of the 1980s and ushered in the illicit trade in high-value gold, guns, girls, fuel and drugs.
The extent to which organised crime has become endemic and pervasive was revealed during the trial of US Consular Officer Thomas Carroll, the mastermind of the US Embassy visa racket. Not only was evidence evinced to prove that at least one Guyanese businessman, Mr Halim Khan, was Mr Carroll’s active criminal collaborator but serving members of the Guyana Police Force’s Target Special Squad were identified as ‘enforcers’ for his illegal enterprise.
The typical contraband coterie in Guyana satisfies the official definition of the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime as “a structured group of three or more persons, existing for a period of time and acting in concert with the aim of committing one or more serious crimes or offences…in order to obtain, directly or indirectly, a financial or other benefit.” The evidence suggests that contraband smuggling is no longer a laissez-faire occupation for a few free-lance, small-time crooks. It has been incorporated as the commercial cornerstone for this country’s highly organised narco-trafficking, gun-running, back-tracking and money-laundering enterprises.
Money-laundering is directly linked to the operations of the entire underground economy, which refers to all business transactions that take place outside of formal and legal markets. Money-laundering conceals the presence, source, and disposition of money derived from illicit activities and cleanses or ‘launders’ dirty money before it can publicly be exchanged for goods and services.
Police raids in Georgetown in November 2006, for example, resulted not only in the arrest of Mr Farouk Razac, the late managing director of a popular cambio. They also netted large amounts of ammunition, assault rifles and grenades, sub-machine guns and magazines and cocaine. This event exemplified the connection between one cambio operator’s cash and a cache of illicit drugs and guns.
The scale and scope of organised crime have expanded steadily over the past decade of laxity, creating an economic sub-sector which provides employment for its own accountants, attorneys and armed retainers. Mr Shaheed ‘Roger’ Khan, an exemplar of the new economy who has now been indicted by a US Grand Jury for conspiring to import cocaine into that country, was the employer of a surprisingly large posse of ex-policemen, many associated with the police force’s discredited Target Special Squad. Prior to his unexpected removal from the local scene, Mr Khan’s Dreamworks Housing Development Company had constructed hundreds of houses at Good Hope on the East Coast, Blankenburg on the West Coast, and at New Hope and Farm on the East Bank.
Mr Peter Morgan, another businessman, had been implicated some years ago in gun-running when he was alleged to be involved in the illegal importation of a small arsenal of semi-automatic weapons, rifles and revolvers in December 1999. He was arrested at Piarco International Airport in March 2007 a few days after an indictment was unsealed in a New York court charging him with narco-trafficking.
But it is fuel smuggling that literally fuels most of this country’s contraband activities. Even now, Mr Omprakash ‘Buddy’ Shivraj still faces charges of storing a quantity of petroleum on his property in September 2005 without a licence issued by the Guyana Energy Agency. Mr Shairaz Ali, proprietor of the Two Brothers petrol stations and Mr Chandradat Ramdass, owner of a vessel on which illicit fuel was found, have been among the few prominent businessmen who have ever been charged with illicit fuel offences. These have not stanched the flow of contraband fuel that has now seeped into the construction, engineering, fishing and quarrying industries.
The wellspring of gold and diamond smuggling is the hinterland, mainly in the Cuyuni-Mazaruni and Potaro-Siparuni Regions where the mining sector is the largest consumer of contraband fuel. Undeclared gold is high in value and is easy to conceal and sell in neighbouring countries. In fact, it is now becoming apparent that the main motive behind the massacre at Bartica on 17 February was the robbery of the CB&R Mining Enterprise owned by Mr Chunilall ‘Vulture’ Babulall and the home of gold dealer Mr Gurudat ‘Mango Man’ Singh. In other words, the motive was criminal and not political as some officials suggest.
The non-implementation of the National Drug Strategy Master Plan, 2005-2009 that was launched nearly three years ago in June 2005 has been essential to ensuring an enabling environment for narco-trafficking. Not a single major organ to conceal and sell in neighbouring countries. In fact, it is now becoming apparent that the main motive behind the massacre at Bartica on 17 February was the robbery of the CB&R Mining Enterprise owned by Mr Chunilall ‘Vulture’ Babulall and the home of gold dealer Mr Gurudat ‘Mango Man’ Singh. In other words, the motive was criminal and not political as some officials suggest.
The non-implementation of the National Drug Strategy Master Plan, 2005-2009 that was launched nearly three years ago in June 2005 has been essential to ensuring an enabling environment for narco-trafficking. Not a single major organ prescribed by the strategy is functional: the National Anti-Narcotics Co-ordinating Secretariat has not yet been established; the National Anti-Narcotics Commission has not been convened; nor do the Joint Intelligence Co-ordination Centre, the Joint Anti-Narcotics Committee and the several Regional Anti-Drugs Units function in the way the strategy dictates. It is therefore no surprise that drug smuggling flourishes.
The country’s airspace is so insecure that, as recently as December last year, a new illegal airstrip was found at Wanatoba about 130 km upriver from Orealla on the Corentyne River. This is not the first, and will not be the last, illegal airstrip constructed to import narcotics. One was built at Tacama in 1989 and damaged aircraft were found at Bartica in 1998, Mabura Hill in 2000 and Kwapau in 2005. In all of these cases, the aircraft were suspected of having brought cocaine into the country. The administration has never quite managed to provide the civil aviation authorities and law enforcement agencies with the resources to detect illegal fights or to conduct continuous surveillance of this country’s airspace.
The country’s maritime space is similarly as insecure as its airspace. Last year, the Guyana Revenue Authority charged Joseph ‘Daddo’ Sahadeo and seven others with the evasion of import duties and dealing with goods with intent to defraud the revenue of duties in what was then termed the biggest bust in this country’s history. The men were caught in the 14th February ‘Valentine’s Day’ bust in which some $70M of uncustomed beverages were seized from aboard Sahadeo’s ship, the Lady Kimberly.
It was only in mid-February this year that the Authority charged Mr Joshua Safeek and one of his subsidiaries, Kong Inc., with intent to avoid the payment of duty, estimated to be in excess of $300 million, in relation to a quantity of allegedly uncustomed, imported beer.
There is much ambivalence about the contraband business at the levels of both the public at large and the private sector. A prominent member of the Upper Corentyne Chamber of Commerce, for example, called for the illegal trade with Suriname to be legitimised rather than penalized, arguing that legitimate transactions at the official port were “inconvenient and time-consuming.” The businessman actually suggested that “the back track [contraband] trade…is assisting Guyana’s economy.”
The big question is whether the administration is prepared to pay the political cost of enforcing effective measures to interdict the lucrative contraband commerce, particularly from Suriname and Venezuela, through which various commodities including illegal fuel, narcotics and firearms enter the country and through which criminals can come and go as they please. Despite its ritual intonation of the law and the iteration of its intention to eradicate smuggling, the administration has actually done next to nothing to solve the problem. Fuel smuggling alone costs the state about $6 billion annually in revenue. The value of all contraband is incalculable.
The contraband trade will not cease of its own accord. It continues to be lucrative only because of this country’s reliably and relatively low level of law enforcement. The loss of revenue might be bad enough but the greater danger to the state has been the opening of the floodgates for other more serious crimes. Given the administration’s lack of interest and its commensurate inadequate allocation of resources for effective enforcement by the Guyana Revenue Authority’s Customs and Trade Administration, the Guyana Defence Force’s Coast Guard, the Guyana Police Force and the Guyana Energy Agency itself ? all of which have been starved of sufficient staff and surveillance resources ? the contraband economy and the crimes associated with it are guaranteed to flourish undiminished, for years to come.
