GEORGETOWN, Guyana, (DPI) – Part of any government’s responsibility is ensuring that the integrity of its resources is protected and its people are protected against fraudulent practices.
Against this backdrop, the government of Guyana has made a clarion call for relevant authorities to launch a full investigation into gold smuggling practices on Thursday. The government has also called for an investigation to be launched targeting those corrupt officials who may be found complicit.
This call was made by vice-president of Guyana, and general secretary of the ruling People’s Progressive Party, Dr Bharrat Jagdeo, who was at the time speaking at his party’s press conference since its successful reelection at the September 1 polls.
The investigation, as Dr Jagdeo highlighted, should be focused on the alleged gold smuggling by the Mohamed family, with the smuggling amounting to US$50 million worth of gold out of the country.
Dr Jagdeo called on the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) and the Guyana police force to “immediately start the investigation of all of those corrupt officials and the gold board who collaborated with the Mohamed’s in smuggling gold.”
The United States Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) had recently sanctioned Nazar Mohamed and his son, Azruddin, and following that, they have now been indicted by a grand jury in the US District Court for the Southern District of Florida. The 12-page indictment includes various charges that range from wire fraud, mail fraud and money laundering that surround their export of gold to the United States.
The US authorities suggest that the main goal of the pair was to enrich themselves while defrauding the government of Guyana by evading the stipulated taxes and royalties on goods exports. It is alleged by the US authorities that the scheme resulted in more than US$50 million that was lost in taxes and royalties to the GoG.
In full effort for transparency, Dr Jagdeo proposed that the local investigation should transcend both the 2015-2020 APNU-led period and the time since the PPP/C has been in government.
The vice-president reminded that during the election campaign, he guaranteed that there would be no vendetta against the Mohameds, who at the time were campaigning under the We Invest in Nationhood (WIN) political party, but that there would be enough time after the election season was over.
“We did not want these matters to be dealt with in the election period. There would be time enough after the elections to go after these individuals who have collaborated, and that time is now,” Dr Jagdeo stated. He suggested that the scope of the investigation should not be limited only to the Mohameds, but should also include anyone found complicit by the Guyana Gold Board.
“I expect that a full-fledged investigation would be launched into those people from the gold board, including GHK Lall and the others who may have been complicit in assisting the Mohamed’s to evade the massive sum of taxes,” Dr Jagdeo expressed.
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