Chairman of the Mayor & City Council’s Finance Committee Councillor Junior Garrett is determined to finalize plans which will see the body reclaiming Value Added Tax (VAT) that was paid to the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA).
“In March of this year, we decided to have a VAT reclamation clerk. It’s now June, six months into the year, and to date, that has not been put in place. You have departments that are non-functional like the IT Department and we can utilize staff from that department. This issue of VAT is important because every month we have to find $5 million to pay GRA and we have money to reclaim,” Garrett said at yesterday’s statutory meeting.
The Finance Committee head stated that this is a very important issue, which should be addressed immediately. He explained that some steps had already been taken but the process is not yet completed.
“If we paying VAT and can’t get reclamation of VAT, then we should charge VAT to the rate payers. That is how VAT works,” he noted, urging that a decision be taken to have two clerks appointed for this purpose. “We have excess staff in the IT Departments,” he reiterated. “We are in a dire financial position but I don’t think the administration is aware because they get salaries at least a week after.”
Chairing the meeting was Mayor of Georgetown Hamilton Green, who expressed amusement at the issue at hand, pointing out that it is one that was spoken about since last year. Adding to this was Councillor Ranwell Jordan, who considered the situation an “emergency” and agreed it should be addressed.
Town Clerk Yonette Pluck-Cort explained that she has written to the relevant authority and was told that she will receive a response today.
Deputy Mayor Patricia Chase-Green asked that councillors agree that based on that response, the administration would put measures in place for the reclamation process.
She further stated that she expected that at this time, she would have been able to receive a financial report from the Treasury Department, but to date, this has not been done. She further stated that a review of the budget needs to be done. “How are we going to address these emergencies without a review,” she enquired.
Garrett also brought to the attention of his fellow councillors the alarming phone bill, which the council is forced to pay on a monthly basis. “We are paying a $1.2 million phone bill, of which calls are made by junior staff. We are paying cell phone calls and calls to America, Canada, the UK, Bahamas, all over the place. For one Aduni Christian, we paid $27,000 in one month! The staff abuse their privileges,” he posited.
