As allegations of corruption continue to surface president of the Transparency Institute of Guyana Inc (TIGI) Gino Persaud says that this scourge must be confronted head on and those implicated must not be given an option to resign.
“I hold resolutely to the view that we, the people, must be fearless in confronting corruption, demanding accountability and insisting on the prosecution of private and public officials engaged in corrupt practices,” Persaud, a lawyer by profession, said during an interview with Stabroek News, in which he said it is time for the corrupt to be jailed to send a strong message.
Persaud said corruption has again been squarely placed on the front burner in the light of recent resignations and revelations that have gripped the nation in the past few weeks. He said the allegations ranged from pharmaceuticals to fake duty free letters to misuse of the state-owned National Communication Network (NCN) and the impecunious City Council scarce funds. “We cannot ignore it any longer,” he told this newspaper.
“Pervasive corruption,” according to the TIGI head, has been alluded to by calls for stout action by former longstanding executive member of the PPP Ralph Ramkarran, who tendered his resignation to the party yesterday.
Persaud said Ramkarran, a Senior Counsel and former Speaker, had stated that he knew enough verifiable instances of corruption to satisfy himself that it was a pervasive problem.
“However, I strongly believe that resignations alone cannot and ought not to bring closure to grave issues of corruption where there has been a breach of the criminal law. Where serious fraud is being alleged then a thorough investigation ought to result in the prosecution of all persons involved if there is sufficient evidence,” he said. Persaud said private and public officials who have committed criminal acts should not be allowed “to walk scot free by simply being offered the option of mere resignation”.
More so, he said, where serious fraud involves the misuse of taxpayers’ money, the people must demand the prosecution of such wrong-doing. Internationally, he said, fraudsters such as Allen Stanford and Bernie Madoff were sentenced to prison. More recently, he told this newspaper Rajat Gupta, a Managing Partner of Mckinsey & Co and a director of Goldman Sachs has been convicted of serious financial fraud.
Persaud noted that he welcomed the resignations of the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of NCN and the CEO of GT & T. They both formally announced their resignation last Friday following investigations into financial irregularities at their respective companies.
Persaud stated Keith Burrowes recently recommended 18 charges against employees of the City Council accused of fraud, which was unearthed by Ramon Gaskin. In highlighting another allegation of corruption, he said that the Guyana Revenue Authority recently made public a fraud involving fake duty free letters and several ATVs imported under such letters. He stated that in the light of this revelation, an employee is yet to be prosecuted while two junior officers have been sent home. He expressed hope that the ongoing investigation would reveal enough evidence to prosecute those liable, while questioning if any of the uncustomed vehicles have been seized.
During the interview, he called for the prosecution of all persons “reasonably suspected of being involved in serious fraud in the instances mentioned above” and recommended that the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) be consulted in these matters and be provided with the appropriate files containing the evidence and conclusion of those detailed investigations.
He also opined that where charges are laid, the Office of the DPP should prosecute and not police prosecutors, since the latter are not trained in the law. If the DPP is short on human resources, he added then special prosecutors should be retained.
Last week, Persaud stated, TIGI had cause to speak on the issue of a conflict of interest. A few days later the Board of the Atlantic Tele Network (ATN) acted on a violation of principles of ethics and conflict of interest.
Persaud stated that there should also be public disclosure at an appropriate time of sufficient particulars of the corrupt transactions so that “the people of Guyana are made aware of the details of the corrupt transactions so they can better understand the phenomenon of corruption and the sophisticated way in which it is carried out”.
He said that everyone needs to be concerned about prosecuting the corrupt. “There must be no out-of-court settlement where corruption has been uncovered,” he said, recalling that only recently Commissioner General Khurshid Sattaur informed the nation that the GRA would “jail” its employees and businessmen who set out to rob the state of revenues through unscrupulous business activities. Persaud said that as a former GRA prosecutor who obtained several convictions for the state, “I wish to endorse his position”.
He went on to state that it was heartening for him to read that at the Private Sector Commission’s AGM President Donald Ramotar stated that he has not turned a blind eye to the fact that corrupt practices exist within government sectors in situations, where officials use positions of influence to frustrate persons conducting legitimate business.
He told this newspaper that the declarations by the President and Sattaur “should manifest itself through the prosecutions of corrupt public officials who commit serious fraud”.
According to Persaud, the high standards of transparency and accountability expected in the public sector should be equally applied to the private sector. “Too often we focus on corruption in the public sector but ignore corruption within the private sector. It is easy to condemn public officials but we must also condemn corruption in the private sector whenever we experience it and call for the prosecution of such persons. Officials in the private sector who hold positions of trust must be held accountable,” he said.
He explained that in May this year the DPP of Barbados Charles Leacock called on companies and other institutions to stop hiding white collar crimes in an attempt to protect the image of their businesses. The DPP made that call as he addressed the AGM of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Barbados (ICAB) at Hilton Barbados, Persaud said. He said the DPP told accountants that the low level of police investigations and prosecutions by his office were directly linked to under-reporting of white collar crimes by victims – usually banks and other corporate entities.
Meanwhile, Persaud said that unless Guyanese confront corruption fearlessly “we are not seriously interested in fighting the scourge of corruption which affects each and every citizen. I, like Sattaur, am in agreement with jailing the corrupt. Only then will the message be loud and clear that corruption will not be tolerated.”
