Dear Editor,
Some years ago, I raised the very issue I am again about to raise in a letter published by your newspaper. The response I got was a torrent of abuse from the then, now late Commissioner-General of the GRA, Kurshid Sattaur, and his minions at the GRA. My parents always taught us to never speak ill of the dead, and in keeping with their admonition, I have decided to restrain myself, Sattaur is not worth it. I know Mr. Statia. He was a colleague at the Bar, albeit for a short time. I am confident that I will not be the subject of any abuse from him. He is, as far as I know, a person of more temperate disposition. The issue can be formulated in some short questions: “If it is that the GRA issues what in common parlance is known as TIN certificates to citizens;
(a) Ought not the GRA to have a database of all TIN certificates it has issued, and if so;
(b) Why is it that officers of the GRA continue to request persons doing business there to produce to the GRA the very TIN certificate that the GRA itself issued to them;
(c) Isn’t this something the GRA can simply pull up from its database?”
Why I raise the issue again, is that a week ago, a Court in a contentious conveyancing proceeding, posed the very questions in exasperation at the delay caused as a result of a request by a GRA officer for a purchaser (not the Vendor) to produce his TIN certificate in an application by the Vendor to the GRA for a certificate of compliance to complete the conveyance. The Learned Judge wondered aloud; “Is this not something they can pull up from their data base since it was they who issued the certificate?”
I look forward to a civil response from the GRA.
Sincerely,
Rafiq Turhan Khan, SC
Attorney-at-Law
