The `Summer Bliss’ from which 476 pounds of gold was seized by armed gunmen, moments after it moored in Curacao, was last in Guyana on June 19 this year and up to now local authorities have been unable to track down its owner, Police Commissioner (ag) Leroy Brumell said yesterday morning.
Brumell was responding to questions from reporters on the case following the Force’s annual awards ceremony.
He said that the last information local authorities have received is that the boat was in Guyana sometime in June. He said that the vessel arrived here on June 17 and left on June 19. He said that police have received information on the name of the person the vessel is registered in as well as an address but that person is yet to be found.
“We did some work but we are still looking. We haven’t been able to find that person”, he told reporters.
The presence of the boat here in June would likely tie Guyanese producers closer to the gold stolen in Curacao.
Asked if the gold came from Guyana, Brumell said that he could not say.
Based on the information gathered by this newspaper the vessel is Guyanese-owned. However there is reportedly no registration record of it at the Guyana Martime Administration Department (MARAD). It is unclear how in spite of this the local investigators have been able to obtain a name and address for the alleged owner.
Local authorities have been tightlipped on the incident which confirms previous reports that gold was being smuggled out of Guyana often to neighbouring Suriname where less taxes are paid. A team from Guyana left for Curacao on Monday as part of the investigation.
Minister of Natural Resources and the Environment Robert Persaud told this newspaper last week that based on the paperwork out of Guyana the gold did not originate from Guyana. Observers have questioned how this conclusion could be drawn especially when the gold was on a vessel linked to Guyana. Moreso since a likely smuggling operation will not present authentic paperwork.
This newspaper was told that some of the gold is from Guyana but was smuggled across the border to Suriname in parts before being made into gold bars.
Based on the comments made by Brumell, local authorities now have to track down where the vessel went after June 19.
Security officials have said that little information will be made public because of the persons who are linked to the gold.
The vessel arrived in Curacao at 4 am two Fridays ago and was attacked shortly after mooring. According to police reports, the robbers went to the port area in three different cars and guards let them inside the restricted area in the mistaken belief that they were customs officials. The men’s jackets had the word “police” in English but in Curacao the word would have been written in Papiamento, one of the island’s three official languages, as “polis.”
News agency Amigoe reported that six men, carrying guns and wearing masks and hoodies along with the police jackets stormed the ship. At gunpoint, they pushed the 51-year-old captain as well as the three Guyanese crewmen onto the ground.
The perpetrators apparently knew their way around the ship and walked directly to the three metal boxes with the gold bars which had a total weight of 476 lbs and they reportedly took only five minutes to remove them.
Curacao police have said that the gold shipment was legitimate as the required documentation and clearance for that territory were filled out.
