(Trinidad Guardian) At least 20 officers at the Licensing Division are currently under suspension for unethical and fraudulent practices on the job. The disclosure came from Works and Transport Minister Rohan Sinanan days after Transport Commissioner Clive Clarke admitted to Guardian Media that corruption and bobol were rampant at Licensing Offices across the country.
However, Sinanan and the Clarke did not divulge further information as the matters are under investigation and some may even reach as far as the court.
Among the issues Clarke and a small team of licensing officers have been fighting against are duplicate registration of vehicles, buying of driver’s permits, and vehicles being fraudulently registered.
Asked about the fraudulent matters that have tarnished the reputation of Licensing Office for years, Sinanan, speaking in the presence of Clarke at his Port-of-Spain office on Tuesday, said the problem stemmed from the division’s archaic paper-based system.
In 2017, Sinanan said, the ministry began rooting out corruption when they started to computerise the system.
“There was a lot of pushback because some people did not want that to happen. And that exercise has shown a lot of the flaws in the system. We are getting to the point where we will be able to identify the people who are doing it. Over the last two years, we have had about over 20 people who have been under investigation for these unethical practices and we continue to be stern on that,” Sinanan said.
“There is no service at the Licensing Office where you have to pay an employee to help you.”
He said if there was a demand for unethical practices, supply will always be high.
“There will only be corrupt officers at the Licensing Office if there is a demand for them. The problem at the Licensing Office is that the system allowed for that because nobody wants to go to the office and spend two and three days to get a simple thing like a transfer done.”
Sinanan said if the owner of a truck loses three days’ work valued $6,000 to get a truck inspected, “you wouldn’t think it hard to pay somebody $1,000 to bring that certificate home for you cause you can save $5,000. Those were some of the things that were happening.”
In a bid to reduce delays and long lines, he said his ministry has begun to offer online services.
“So you should only have to go to the Licensiong Office if you have a problem.”
Next year, he said, mobile licensing units will drive into rural communities to offer services to members of the public.
“We are going to have that in the first or second quarter of 2021 where in all the rural areas these mobile units will drive in on specific dates so nobody would have to leave their area to come into Port-of-Spain, Arima, or Sangre Grande to get simple things done.”
