Dear Editor,
In January of this year, investigators of the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) swooped down on a bond in the city and discovered Polar Beer which they suspected to have been smuggled.
One month later, and after intensive investigations including perusal of the bill books of the company owning the bond, the Guyana Revenue Authority instituted 22 charges against the company and one of its principals. The charges were in relation to the dealing with uncustomed goods with intent to defraud the GRA of duties thereupon.
Understandably, these charges could not proceed since the company at the centre of the investigations approached the high court through an ex-parte application and was successful in securing an order nisi preventing the GRA from sealing the bond, interfering with its contents or instituting any form of prosecution until the matter was concluded. The court has since made absolute the orders in relation to the sealing of the bond and its contents but has discharged the injunction preventing the GRA from proceeding with prosecution.
