The Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) last Friday initiated a new system for randomly examining imports and Commissioner-General Khurshid Sattaur is hopeful that it will result in fewer false declarations.
A thorough manual inspection was conducted on a 40 ft container consigned to Frank De Abru last Friday,
when the “Random Selection of Imported Goods for Examination” exercise was conducted at the Demerara Shipping Company Ltd on Water Street.
A release from GRA said that members of the public, including the press, were invited to witness the process of officials from GRA’s Goods Examination Unit conducting a 100% percent inspection of the shipment.
GRA noted that the 100% examination of commercial imports will follow every random selection exercise that the GRA holds at its 200-201 Camp Street headquarters. In this exercise, members of the public are invited to select an importer for inspection from a list of import declarations lodged at Customs and Trade Administration.
At the end of the relatively smooth process, it revealed, the officer conducting the examination reported that of the 2,450 cartons of ketchup declared, two carton boxes had been short-shipped. However, the consignee did not wish to claim the “short shipment.”
Commenting on the process, Sattaur was reported in the release as praising the work being done by his officers, which he said was fully supported by members of the private sector since it will increase transparency. Sattaur said that “since the selection process is random, the suggestion that persons are being victimized would no longer be a valid excuse for those who wish to attribute being selected for such customs procedure as being targeted or victimized.” According to the release, Sattaur further stated that “it is hoped that the fear of public exposure through this process of some importers who are bent on continuing with their unsavoury practice of making false declarations to evade the payment of the correct taxes, will deter such practices and lead to much greater facilitation of the processing of documents and release imported commercial goods.”
GRA announced that the random selection of imported goods for examination will be conducted on a regular basis in the GRA’s compound and members of the public are invited to participate. Other examinations have been held since the one conducted last Friday.
It said that information on future scheduled dates for the random selection exercise and inspection of selected import declarations at the respective wharf or transit shed will be made available on GRA’s Facebook and Twitter accounts.
