Dear Editor,
I refer to your article ‘Rohee dismisses call for audit of police $90M’ (SN March 16, 2012) for which I was intrigued by the fact that the cheque allocated to buy food and cover transportation for policemen had the name D. Ramnarine, Asst. Commissioner as the payee.
My recollection of how the government accounting system worked in the past would not have permitted such madness. Mr. Ramnarine’s name should only appear as the payee, if the entire sum was an advance to him personally to engage in government work and for which he would have produced receipts and vouchers to clear the advance. Alternatively, if the money was the sum of advances to individual policemen as was likely the case, then they each should have had personal cheques written in their names with supporting documentation. Also, if the money was to pay for transportation, then the name of the provider of the transportation service should have appeared on the cheque. Similarly, a cheque should have been prepared for the supplier of the food and a cashier/paymaster should have been directly in charge of the process not the Asst. Commissioner. This approach allows transparency and accountability as an appropriate paper trail is established for government follow up work, if the need arises.
Currently, the present system opens too many opportunities for fraud as it makes the ultimate payee invisible. This is how it was done when the supplier of the service could not read or write, but policemen certainly have those skills and therefore this is the wrong methodology. What is more disturbing, however, is the fact that by placing Mr. Ramnarine’s name on the cheque, he is no longer a policeman responsible for police work at election time, but he is now a supplier and accountant for non police services. What a waste of talent.
Equally troubling is the fact that Mr. Ramnarine was turned into a ‘Fundraiser in Chief’ in the Community for which he had to apply the law of the land. What an untenable and compromised situation to be sucked into because of failed oversight. Unquestionably, an audit is necessary and the accounting system needs to be upgraded for policemen must be policemen and not anything else.
Yours faithfully,
C Kenrick Hunte
