Dear Editor,
Politics as practised by the Jagdeo regime are becoming more predictable as this plagued term of office fast approaches its expiry date. When one notices that all the ghost writers like the Todd Morgans and the Elizabeth Dalys are woken from their graves with a few real creatures of the regime, like Dr Prem Misir, as flavouring for the PR spin, we must be alert enough to know that the maximum leader has messed up again. I had the displeasure of being sent the column of Dr Misir by a friend (I have nothing personal against the good doctor). What I found in this article was a fair share of dishonesty with respect to the Clico meeting. Dr Misir said that the meeting “was not the time and place for playing political games.” What was President Jagdeo doing at that meeting, if not playing political games with the poor man’s future? The judicial system in Guyana has legally appointed a liquidator and nowhere on that document is the name Bharrat Jagdeo inscribed. The President has no locus standi in the liquidation process.
All Guyanese must be grateful to the Chief Justice of Guyana for his timely ruling in favour of the liquidation of Clico’s assets, and the appointment of a liquidator. Not one cent of the money which will be distributed belongs to either the government or the PPP. No favours were asked by the policyholders and thus no favours were granted. The policyholders are receiving what was justly theirs. So I could not understand why the President was playing all these political games by inserting himself into a highly technical matter that requires competence of a special nature that the Office of the President does not possess. The President’s actions may have even delayed the Bank of Guyana from doing their technical work. There is much work for the Bank of Guyana to do including analyzing the company’s assets, turning them into cash and determining the best way to distribute them to the policyholders and other creditors of Clico. There is a broad methodology for conducting liquidations including:
1. the Bank of Guyana must notify the Registrar of Companies of their appointment and the upcoming compulsory liquidation;
2. usually within a prescribed number of days of its appointment, the Bank of Guyana would have to write all policyholders and other creditors informing them of their appointment;
3. the Bank of Guyana would have to call a meeting setting out the powers of the liquidators and the proposed strategy for the compulsory liquidation subject to the realization of the tangible and other assets;
4. the policyholders and other creditors would have to be given notice of the liquidation meeting which is supposed to be called by the Bank of Guyana;
5. best practice requires that a liquidation committee be formed headed by the chairman of the court appointed liquidator (the Governor), a representative from the policyholders and other creditors and including other key and critical stakeholders such as someone from the professional fraternity (qualified accountant), to oversee the interest of all parties for transparency purposes;
6. the final decision for the distribution of the proceeds rest with the court appointed liquidator (the Governor, not President Jagdeo);
7. at the end of the process the Bank of Guyana ought to produce liquidation statements of how the proceeds were raised and how they were distributed, including liquidation fees and other costs and provide for an audit of the process.
The truth is, this is just the skeleton of the process since there are many more specific procedures to be followed to prevent future legal action against the liquidator. Nowhere in the best practices is there a role for politicians unless they are policyholders. Thus I can now understand the low turnout to the ‘political’ meeting. Unfortunately, Mr Ram should have stayed away from this Clico meeting, since it has no basis in law and there was no justification for it, save and except that it was politics at the poor people’s expense.
If we are to resolve the Clico fiasco satisfactorily (it took place on President Jagdeo’s watch) due respect should have been granted to the office of the Governor of the Bank of Guyana by allowing that office to conduct itself in a court ordered prescribed manner. This abrogation of the authority of the powers of the Governor is a precedent that has now been institutionalized by the Jagdeo government. Unfortunately, their shortsightedness is contributing to a permanent down-grading of the state institutions which has an adverse impact on their effectiveness and efficiency. Many young talented professionals who are in these institutions are ready to book the next flight out of Guyana to run away from the “do as I say” style of government; a style of governance that does not provide them with the opportunity to think creatively and proactively to facilitate technical solutions to the nation’s challenges.
Yours faithfully,
Sasenarine Singh
