The Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU) is seeking legal advice from the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) to determine if charges should be instituted against persons implicated in an alleged fraud committed during the construction of the New Guyana Marketing Corporation (GMC) headquarters.
Head of SOCU Sydney James yesterday explained that the unit was tasked with investigations pertaining to the rehabilitation of the GMC’s office building and $1.3 billion taken from the Contingencies Fund for the GMC’s fertilizer programme.
James stated that SOCU has already completed its investigation in relation to the rehabilitation of the office building.
A forensic audit of the New GMC for the period January 1, 2012 to May 31, 2015 had recommended a police investigation into the substandard work done during the construction of the GMC headquarters by a Trinidad-based contracting company.
The audit said the principals of the firm, Constantine Engineering and Construction Services, should be charged for using substandard building materials and be barred from executing projects for the government, while the Agriculture Ministry engineer who certified the payments “should be charged criminally and brought before the courts for his participation in conducting fraud against the Government of Guyana.”
James said during SOCU’s investigations several persons were questioned and based on the information gathered a file was prepared and sent to the office of the DPP.
He noted that investigations are continuing into $1.3 billion taken from the Contingencies Fund and SOCU will seek advice upon completion.
The audit report said that there was fraudulent reporting of the fertilizer programme funds. “During the period 2008 through 2014, it appears that GMC entered into a series of questionable and apparently fraudulent financial transactions in regards to the management of the fertilizer account,” it said.
“It appeared that the entire fertilizer program was conceptualized to circumvent financial accountability laws and to provide funding to GuySuCo and others using sinister methods,” the audit report said, having cited payments to the RPA of $35,032,500; excess repayment to GNCB of $120,000,000 over funds provided to GMC; a $450,000,000 loan to GuySuCo; payment to GuySuCo for letter of credit arrangement in the sum of $273,363,030; and payments to the tune of $111,204,726 to the Ministry of Agriculture for Vertical Pumps.
It said these payments were concluded without proper support or authority and recommended that government determine what action should be taken against then General Manager Nizam Hassan and the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture for their mismanagement of the programme.
