Dear Editor
The flood relief grant programme and other grant programmes seem to be in a mess. Cash is being doled out without accountability. The party’s investigations reveal scams, schemes, and bureaucratic bungles in the handing out of mitigation grants. The government should be wary of doling out relief grants. The URP has received many complaints about problems and scams doling out the grants. Word on the ground is that some officials responsible for collecting information and or approving the relief are skimming off the grant and being engaged in rampant fraud of money meant for the victims. There is no proper accountability for expenditure. Thus, the party calls for an auditor’s report and investigation into expenditures of the varied grant programmes. The party also calls on the government to make available to the public the list of flood relief recipients for all ten regions.
It has come to our attention that there are problems in giving out the pension grant money; people informed us that they are bounced around, sent to different locations to pick up their pension grant and book. Government should get its act together. There is misinformation that government is giving people free money. It is not free money or the politician’s or ruling party’s money. It is the peoples’ hard earned money that is being used to provide relief for those in financial distress. The money comes from the taxes people pay from their earnings and from purchasing goods. There are complaints of favouritism in distribution of grants especially to ruling party activists. Those known not to support the ruling party are bypassed for the grant. Political opportunists get a share of the pie. Those eligible and deserving of grant should get their money and a fair share.
A lot of money is being doled out to those not affected. There is need for an account of the amount of money spent on varied grants and who were the recipients. The amount of money spent by government on hampers, beds, supplies, sanitizers, and other goods should be made publicly available. It is well known, as reported by so many people, that those responsible for approving and or giving the grants are making deals for drawbacks. It has come to the party’s knowledge that those who planted rice and or other crops hardly received fair assistance to re-start planting while those who didn’t plant rice or crops received huge amounts of relief. Govern-ment should commission a prosecutorial study on fraud during the flood relief as well as the Covid-19 grant of $25K. We want accountability of all grants. Some people reported that they signed for $25K but received only $20K – the $5K difference was the fee for approving the grant. Some feel it is better to forego the $5K and get $20K rather than nothing. Many still have not received their $25K grant, including the leader of the URP. The Vice President said that the flood relief grant is being probed and that those found involved in fraud will be will be fired.
Who are the people engaging in fraud? Do they have political connection? And why only ‘fired’? They should also face fraud charges. Jailing is an appropriate solution to set an example of those involv-ed in fraud. The URP calls on the government for a complete audit of all relief grants.
Sincerely,
Vishnu Bandhu
Leader of URP
