Nadir said on Wednesday that during the course of last year the Ministry had done a lot of work as it relates to Co-operatives and Friendly Societies and plans to intensify efforts during the new year.
He said that amendments are going to be tabled shortly to the Friendly Societies Act to allow for more democratization of non-government organizations. He said too that NGOs will be required to report all external contributions.
“These changes are necessary because of several problems we’ve found with NGOs” Nadir said. Explaining the position, Nadir said that “whenever there is available grants to NGOs, you see a massive increase in applications for registration….After they receive the monies, we never see any compliance with the Laws of Guyana which govern friendly societies”, he continued. “These require the annual returns to be filed… And what happens is that the entire country gets a bad name because funds that come from any international partner be it an international NGO, an international financial institution, a donor government…when it comes to Guyana there is a national responsibility for transparency and accountability”, the Minister stated.
He noted that the Labour Ministry has been partnering with the Canadian Co-operative Development Association towards developing a programme to reinvigorate interest in Co-operatives. He said that efforts have also been made to make internal changes and this includes having all Regional Co-operative officers report to the central office at the Ministry of Labour. According to the minister, the Ministry has had to take over a number of co-operatives including some in the agriculture sector because of mismanagement or poor management.
Meanwhile, speaking about credit unions, he said that locally these entities hold almost $11 billion in assets. He, however, bemoaned the way some of these credit unions were being run. He stated that during this year, the plan is to bring the supervision and regulation of the movement under the Bank of Guyana. “We see this as necessary in order to protect contributions of members and to ensure good management and accountability for management”, the minister stated.
