Government has ordered the National Industrial and Commercial Investments Ltd (NICIL) to take legal action to recover the outstanding US$5 million from Hong Kong Golden Telecom Limited (HKGT) for the purchase of government shares in the Guyana Telephone and Telegraph Company (GTT).
This disclosure was made by Minister of State Harmon during his post-Cabinet press briefing yesterday. “Cabinet has passed this matter onto the Ministry of Finance to advise NICIL to proceed to take the legal steps that are necessary for us to be able to recover this sum of money,” Harmon said. The two sides have been locked in negotiation for in excess of two years to resolve the situation.
The shares were sold to the Chinese firm in 2012. The deal was entered into by the then PPP/C administration but only US$25 million of the agreed US$30 million was known to have been paid.
In March 2016, Harmon and a delegation controversially travelled to China to engage in discussions regarding the outstanding money.
While it was later stated that Harmon had obtained documents which showed that the money was paid over prior to the APNU+AFC coalition taking office and efforts were underway to track the money, NICIL had said that it had not received the outstanding balance. The government later clarified that no such documents were received.
In December 2016, it was revealed that NICIL was on the verge of preparing to begin arbitration to recover the outstanding balance. NICIL’s head Horace James had informed at the time that the entity had already started consultations with the US lawyer who helped the company to draft the sales agreement. A firm in the UK was recommended for the arbitration aspect of the matter, he had said, before explaining that it was important that UK-based legal experts were used as the arbitration would take place in London. However, it was subsequently decided that NICIL would engage HKGT on a one-on-one basis as opposed to getting a third party involved.
Since then, the two sides were locked in negotiations. In February, James said that a deadline of the end of the first quarter had been set to conclude negotiations. In August, he said that an offer made by HKGT was declined as it was found to be “totally unacceptable.” He had explained that the entity will await the advice of the government on the way forward.
