AFC MP Cathy Hughes yesterday said that the ongoing investigation of financial records at the National Communications Network (NCN) has vindicated the opposition decision to cut the $82M subvention proposed for the entity in the national budget, while pointing out that it is possible that past allocations may not be properly accounted for.
“The recent disclosures show that the AFC’s position on the budget cuts on NCN has been vindicated and we feel if similar investigations were done in other agencies the results could be the same,” Hughes told Stabroek News in an invited comment.
The investigation, initiated by NCN’s board, has seen programme manager Martin Goolsarran being sent on administrative leave, after it was found that a $3.9M cheque from the Guyana Telephone & Telegraph (GT&T) was made payable to him instead of the company. It is understood that the management of GT&T was so impressed with the work done by NCN’s production team that it decided to pay an incentive to the workers, hence the cheque.
Stabroek News understands that NCN’s management was aware that the cheque was made payable to Goolsarran, who has been with the company for over 30 years. However, the board only learnt of the payment after one of the workers expressed dissatisfaction with what he received and he raised some questions.
Hughes said yesterday that it was unfortunate that from 2004 to now, the government did not see it fit to have an audit done of the company, while pointing out that the last financial report laid in the National Assembly was in 2004. As a result, she said it is possible that the millions in subsidies over the last eight years may not be properly accounted for.
“We in the AFC are encouraged by the revelations. We are expecting continued full disclosure. We expect no cover up and we hope that NCN will change the way it does business and the way it serves the people of Guyana,” Hughes said.
The decision to investigate the incentive payment was taken at a meeting by board members last week Tuesday to examine how the $82M government subvention, which was cut to $1 by the combined opposition, would affect the company. At the time, board members were also examining a proposal by the management of the company on the way forward, in light of the cut of the subvention. The board decided to dig deeper upon seeing the proposal, since NCN has publicly indicated that most of its revenues come from advertising and that it raked in over $500M in advertising revenue last year.
At the meeting were Chairman of the Board Dr. Prem Misir, who is also Pro-Chancellor of the University of Guyana, Head of the Publicity Unit at the Office of the President Kwame McCoy, consultant Magot Boyce, who is attached to the One Laptop Per Family (OLPF) project and Andrea Brandford. Missing from the meeting were head of the Privatisation Unit Winston Brassington and General Secretary of the Rice Producers Association Dharamkumar Seeraj.
When contacted, Misir, who would have signed the letter sending Goolsarran home, told Stabroek News that he was unable to comment on the issue since there is yet to be any outcome. He also refused to acknowledge that there was an “investigation,” saying that the board is just examining the company’s records following the cut of the subvention, as all companies would have done.
“I still cannot make a comment because we have just started and for me to comment would only prejudice the situation. There has been no outcome, it is still ongoing,” Misir said, while refusing to characterize the review as an investigation.
When it was pointed out that Goolsarran has been sent home, Misir said while that might be so, it does not mean he has done something wrong. He said any company would have “conflicts” and the board is trying to fix this. “There are problems and we are trying to fix these, any company does that,” he maintained.
Goolsarran himself confirmed to Stabroek News that he was sent home but indicated that he was unclear as to the reason. He was hopeful that he would be given an opportunity to defend himself.
It is understood that the situation has several employees at the company uneasy and one employee has since resigned, since he was asked to make changes to a document by someone in the company’s finance department. Reports are that the employee indicated that to do that would have amounted to forgery and he has since tendered his resignation.
Stabroek News was also told that at a NCN meeting with the major advertisers, it was reported that the advertisements that were to be played during the company’s core national programming are being cut by the management in Berbice, who would then replace them with other ads.
According to reports, when an advertiser pays for their ads to be aired during programmes such as the news or cricket, it is expected that the ads would be aired countrywide. “But we are getting reports that Berbice has been cutting out these ads and replacing them with their own ads and that is not right,” a source had told this newspaper.
