Former president Donald Ramotar yesterday said that neither he nor the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) was ever close to convicted cash smuggling pilot Khamraj Lall and that all meetings and dealings with him were strictly on a business level.
Ramotar and former Minister of Public Works Robeson Benn also disputed the finding by a recent audit that Lall’s proposal for a private hangar at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA) bypassed its board and was expeditiously processed.
“I am in total disagreement of the implying that this man was close to the PPP. I don’t know this man and I can say categorically, ‘No! That he has ever contributed a cent to the coffers of the PPP,’” Ramotar told Stabroek News yesterday.
US District Judge Jay A. Garcia-Gregory on Tuesday sentenced Lall, who pleaded guilty to bulk cash smuggling, to one year in jail and has ordered that his private jet and over half a million US dollars seized from him be forfeited to the US government.
Searches of Lall’s private aircraft during a refueling stop at the Luis Munoz International Airport, in San Juan, on November 22nd, 2014, uncovered the cash. US$150,000 was wrapped in plastic bags and a blanket under the exit row seat and US$470,000, in a black suitcase, was found inside a compartment next to the engines. Lall was travelling to Guyana at the time.
Lall had flown Ramotar on official trips on several occasions. These reports triggered consternation and questions as to what due diligence had been carried out on him before the decision was made to assign him a private hangar.
Ramotar yesterday said that while he travelled on the plane owned and flown by Lall while he was president, those decisions were not personally made and were done through and paid for officially by the Office of the President.
“The first time I met this man is when I went on official duty …it was a commercial arrangement and was paid for by Office of the President. It was not a favour to anyone. It saved us time and as far as I understand it was not very, very much more expensive than if we had travelled by an airline,” he said.
Both he and Benn yesterday also rubbished the recent CJIA audit report, which states that the proposal by the convicted money smuggler bypassed the CJIA Board and was hastily expedited.
“The man had in 2010 expressed the desire. He was told to make a proposal. People were aware of it and it came through in 2012 or so at that time… when his proposal came to the Cabinet, it recommended that this service was good for Guyana, not only the executive jet service but a medivac service that could have been useful for the people of the country,” Ramotar explained.
“That the proposal was processed quickly, I believe the people were working on a premise of a directive that I had given to cut out bureaucracy and red tape …besides I do not know of any application by any other person that wanted to do what he was doing, that was skipped over or rejected. I have no knowledge of that,” he added.
He further explained that the order that processes be speeded up to avoid a backlog of applications by persons for compliances throughout the public sector was made by him as complaints had been numerous about the time spent to get documentation for various things.
Ramotar said that Lall’s proposal fell into a countrywide plan his administration had to develop the aviation sector.
‘Not a jumbie umbrella’
An audit of the CJIA, ordered by the current coalition government, found that the proposal for Lall’s hangar at the CJIA was never brought to the attention of the CJIA board but was taken directly to Cabinet by Benn.
In a matter of days of the proposal being seen by Benn, Cabinet granted its no-objection to the project. The proposal was prepared by the CJIAC on behalf of Lall’s company, Exec Jet Club LLC.
It revealed that a proposal, dated September 1st, 2012 and titled ‘Application for Land to Construct Hangar at CJIAC,’ was prepared by the CJIAC on behalf of Exec Jet Club and submitted to Benn. A few days later, on September 11th, 2012, Cabinet gave its no objection.
The report said that the former Chairman of the CJIAC Board confirmed that the granting of the lease for the Exec Jet Club was never discussed at Board level.
In response, the CJIAC management said in relation to the procedure for the granting of a lease, it is the practice for various individual/businesses to submit proposals to operate a service at the airport. “These proposals are usually forwarded to the Board of Directors or the minister for further approval,” according to management. It added that Exec Jet Club submitted a proposal which was taken to Cabinet by Benn and this was subsequently approved by Cabinet.
However, the report asserted that granting of a lease to build a multimillion dollar hangar/executive office/apartment cannot be compared with businesses submitting proposals to operate a service at the airport. It pointed out that the Chief Executive Officer reports to the CJIAC Board but the proposal for the ‘Application for Land to Construct Hangar at CJIAC’ on behalf of Exec Jet Club was not discussed with the former CJIAC Board and instead it was submitted to Benn.
But Benn disputed the details of the audit report, stopping short of altogether calling them false.
“I read what the audit said but I don’t know this was totally true. It didn’t happen overnight as is implied. It was not a mushroom, it was not a jumbie umbrella,” Benn asserted.
“I don’t know if the executive of the airport has the chance to report to the audit… I am not aware if what it [the audit] said happened. I remember touring the facility with the CJIA team. I don’t know there was no meeting with them. They had the required permits … I don’t have any of the documents but we have to check specifically to see if it was tabled at the Board or if discussions happened and it was not recorded formally. I don’t think that [what is reported] is what occurred,” he added.
Benn said that upon learning that there was a conflict of interest where one of the managers at CJIA held the Power of Attorney for the company, he immediately fired the man.
“When I became aware of it, I immediately said he must be dismissed. That he could not be the power of attorney for that operation and be an employee of CJIA,” Benn stated.
He said that his government has come in for much flack on whether due diligence was done before granting the necessary permits to Lall’s company but that people fail to understand that Lall operated legally in the United States and had met all the necessary civil aviation criteria.
Missed
Further, Benn said that as much as Lall’s company has been criticised it is missed by him and he believes by the country. “It was a good. It is missed right now in the country because there are many destinations around Guyana, Venezuela and Brazil and these small islands where we don’t have direct commercial flights to. That was the type of service it was provided and what was sorely needed” Benn said.
