Dear Editor,
Once again I am forced to write defending the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) concerning the misinformation and attempt to distort my comments regarding auditing the owner of the beleaguered aircraft on which in excess of US$600,000 was found, carried in the column of the political commentary of Mr Goolsarran as published in the pages of your newspaper of December 1, 2014.
Let me put in perspective my comments made in the Stabroek News articles which Mr Goolsarran referred to, and which he chose to make such a major issue of, devoting his entire column to attacking me. While I am no stranger to such senseless attacks, since the GRA and myself, as the Commissioner General, had been under attack by the owner of the Kaieteur News only recently for simply conducting an activity that is well within our mandate, I am nevertheless reluctantly responding; and in doing so, I am sure as day follows night, it will elicit a response from this political activist.
The GRA as you know also embarked on court action by filing criminal charges against the owner of the Kaieteur News and this matter is still engaging the attention of the court. During the time of conducting its investigation leading to the charges being filed, there were various attacks by the said newspaper that would appear to have been well orchestrated to destroy the image and credibility of the GRA and tarnish me, and more likely than not scare me into not pursuing my functions which I have the legal authority to perform. It was inevitable, therefore, that there was some amount of damage done which would appear to have affected the collection of revenues of the state.
It is against this background that I displayed to the media my disgust for attempting to bring me back again into the fray and quite appropriately informed the journalist who called me, that I want to be focused on repairing the damage that was caused by the negative reporting, relentlessly carried in the newspaper and well supported by my critics, a category into which Mr Goolsarran obviously falls. This I explained was more important at this point in time than to be dragged into conducting a public trial of the tax affairs of someone whom the USA already has on its radar, which by no means excuses from what its mandate permits.
It should be noted that the Government of Guyana has a treaty for sharing information with the USA, so whatever activities the USA tax authorities conduct on the individual who was alleged to be the pilot of the aircraft would benefit the GRA no doubt, if and when the GRA chooses to investigate this high profile individual.
I reiterate that my current focus is steering the GRA to remain on course with revenue collection for 2014 that Mr Goolsarran is raising issues over. He mischievously and deliberately left these pertinent facts out of his article, obviously to provoke friction.
Yours faithfully,
K Sattaur
