Greene, speaking with this newspaper on January 21, said that the Guyana Police Force (GPF) learnt of the Guyana passports held by Gayus H. Tambunan, his wife Milana Anggareni, and their three children via a media report. “None of the numbers we saw [on the passports] corresponded with our passports [issued],” he had said. “…That was concocted out there…people are constructing passports outside. People do them here with passports that have been used before.”
Greene had said that there had been no correspondence between the GPF and Indonesian police. “Providing that we get information on it, we will try to do something,” he stated. When asked whether the GPF would consider taking independent action, Greene had responded: “I have not recommended any move on this because we have not received any official communication from the foreign [Indonesian] authorities as far as I know.”
On Wednesday, the Jakarta Post reported that the National Police there confirmed that five falsified Guyana passports, bearing photos of tax graft convict Tambunan, his wife Milana Anggareni, and their three children, were officially registered in Guyana. The report also said that the National Police had sent a team to Guyana to investigate the passports allegedly belonging to Tambunan and his family. “The passports [officially] exist,” National Police Chief Detective Commander General Ito Sumardi said late on Tuesday.
Crime Chief Seelall Persaud, however, told this newspaper on Thursday that the GPF was never contacted by Indonesian authorities either directly or by way of Interpol about the falsified passports. Persaud, reiterating the commissioner’s statements, said that GPF learnt of the case via media reports.
He said that the reported passport numbers have been checked and no such documents officially exist nor were any such documents issued by the Republic of Guyana. With regard to the statement in the Jakarta Post that an Indonesian team had visited Guyana, Persaud said he was not aware of such a visit. He further stated that had those officials visited and requested information from the Central Immigration Office, which is headed by Commissioner Greene, the GPF would have been aware of it. “I don’t know where their information about those documents being official came from,” he added.
Why has the GPF not launched an independent investigation in this particular case? In response to this, Persaud stated that there was no reason to conduct an investigation. Tambunan, he noted, is an Indonesian convict and the GPF has no interest in him. However, he stressed that had the Indonesian authorities requested assistance it would have most readily been given by the GPF. “If there are matters where Guyanese are involved,” Persaud said, “then we do take an interest in the matter and in such cases may even contact our counterparts in the other country. But in this case we just do not see the need.”
