This newspaper has grown accustomed to revelations contained in the Reports of the Auditor General, some, indeed many of which set out with considerable clarity the cavalier manner in which public funds are spent and the absence of accountability that attends the process.
With around 25 ministries, departments and regions accounted for in the Report of the Auditor General it is impossible to report on every individual story of financial imprudence, absence of accountability and, frequently, seeming evidence of downright fraud.
But that is not the whole story. Most of the ‘tall tales’ of financial impropriety in state agencies are attended by “recommendations” by the Auditor General. There is really no foolproof way of knowing whether most of these recommendations are pursued with any measure of diligence.
One of the challenges which we face in providing the public with a sense of what the Auditor General thinks about the manner in which public funds are managed reposes in the fact that we simply cannot tell the whole story. Over time, however, we have taken the approach of extracting what we call ‘gems’: instances of financial and recklessness and evidence of chicanery sufficiently blatant and shocking to illustrate the depth of the Auditor General’s concern.
A recurring circumstance of irregularity in the administration of finances in state agencies in Guyana has to do with the purchase and use of fuel. The case of the behaviour of the relevant functionaries in Region Four in the matter of the purchase of fuel as set out in the Auditor General’s report makes the point quite eloquently.
The gist of the Region Four fuel irregularity, according to the Report of the Auditor General, has to do with the fact that during the financial year ended December 31, 2012 amounts of “fuel and lubricants” totalling $1.663 million “were supplied to 16 vehicles not owned by the Region”.
The recommendations arising out of the discovery of a considerable misdirection of fuel intended only for vehicles owned by the region were, first, that the region see that it does not happen again and, second, that the issue be “thoroughly investigated” and that the necessary “corrective and disciplinary measures” – whatever that means – be taken.
Region Four’s fuel-related irregularities during the fiscal year that ended at the end of 2012 did not stop there. Of the $53.701 million worth of fuel and lubricants purchased by Region Four from GuyOil, charge bills were produced for just over $35.5 million. Region Four’s story is that the remaining $18.138 million had been paid “up front” to GuyOil.
The Auditor General has previously pronounced on what appears to be a frequent but apparently irregular practice. There is no confirmation in the Auditor General’s Report that GuyOil is indeed in receipt of the $18.3 million.
Equally worrying is the mention made in the Auditor General’s Report of the uplifting of $733,076 worth in fuel for three cars not owned by the Region.
Two of the vehicles were never registered with the Licence Revenue Department, a circumstance that gives rise to disturbing speculation. While the matter is the subject of an ongoing police investigation, the mind boggles as to the use of the fuel that was consigned to the two vehicles not registered in Guyana.
Irregularities of the nature described in this editorial would appear to be quite commonplace in the day-to-day spending and accounting for public funds; at least that is the impression given in the Annual Report of the Auditor General. What is a good deal more disturbing is that some of the seamier cases of irregularity – the allocation of state fuel to vehicles nor registered in Guyana being a good example – drag on interminably, year in, year out, without, it seems, the authorities ever really getting to the bottom of these matters.
