President Bharrat Jagdeo should follow the example set on Friday by the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago and fulfil his promise to investigate the collapse of Clico (Guyana), AFC Leader Raphael Trotman says.
Trotman said President Jagdeo should order a forensic investigation before the end of the year, with the intention of getting to the bottom of the matter. The AFC Leader noted that Acting Chief Justice Ian Chang when ordering the liquidation of the company mentioned that there were several illegalities in the affairs of the company. He said that the utterances by Justice Chang suggest that there are grounds for prosecution.
Stating that the President has always mentioned having Clico investigated alongside Globe Trust, Trotman said that Jagdeo needed to act on his talk. “We are putting him up to bat. Let’s go,” Trotman said, while suggesting that the probe into Globe Trust was just a red herring by the Head of State.
Trinidad and Tobago’s Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar on Friday announced a commission of enquiry to investigate the CL Financial crisis and the Hindu Credit Union collapse, in Trinidad. The Prime Minister described the Clico debacle as a “scandal of monumental proportions” and “tragedy“.
“Mr Speaker, the root causes of this financial collapse must be fully ventilated. The persons deemed responsible must be held accountable,” she said.
Trinidad, Trotman said, is the “ground zero” of the collapse of Clico companies, and he believes that it should follow that other territories, including Guyana, should have probes to determine what went wrong.
President Jagdeo recently promised to investigate Clico (Guyana) and Globe Trust. “I am prepared… at some point in time to investigate what took place in both institutions so if there are culpable people, we should take action against them. I am prepared to do that,” he said. Jagdeo told this newspaper that he would be setting up a team for the investigation. “We can move forward with this. So I’m going to set a team to look at both,” he said. He said that this team would most likely comprise local personnel.
Trotman, in a recent interview, said the team should comprise both local and regional personnel. He said that while there are capable persons locally, the country does not have a history of doing such large investigations. Trotman said that there is a Caribbean body of Professional Accountants whose services could be sought.
Regarding the funding of the probe, Trotman said that the State should fund this. He said that his party, as well as other opposition parties, would have “no hesitation” supporting legislation that would approve of money taken from the Consolidated Fund for this purpose. Trotman said that this expenditure would be justified if justice is to be brought to these “patent violations of the law” and to restore confidence in the insurance industry.
He said too that the AFC will be moving to have the issue of Clico come up again before the Economic Services Committee in the National Assembly as soon as Parliament comes out of recess.
Recently, PNCR Executive member Lance Carberry said that his party wanted to be fair and to give the President an opportunity to fulfil his promise to conduct an investigation. “We are giving the President the opportunity to prove that his word is his bond,” he said, adding that if the President failed to deliver on his promise it would justify whatever skepticism there may be regarding his promises.
Carberry said the President’s continued linking of the Clico probe with Globe Trust is simply propaganda. “We disabused [him of] that and having been robbed of that propaganda tool, the President has resorted from time to time to threatening an investigation,” he said. “But there is no barrier to an investigation, the party has said very clearly that we would support an investigation,” he said, adding that “the President does not have as a barrier the fact that the party has resisted this investigation.”
GAP/ROAR MP Everall Franklin said that an investigation is necessary. “It’s a travesty of justice, totally unacceptable in a country that calls itself democratic and civilized,” he said.
The $6.9 billion invested by Clico (Guyana) in Clico (Bahamas) represented 53 per cent of the local company’s statutory fund. The country’s Insurance Act states that at least 85 per cent of a company’s statutory fund should be invested locally. The passage of the Caricom Movement of Factors Act created a conflict as it removed restrictions on capital flows but this matter was not addressed by the regulator or the government.
