AML/CFT Legislation… Opposition rejected their own amendments, says AG

Jun 24, 2014 News

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Government delinked agreements that were on the table since last year- APNU  

Attorney General Anil Nandlall is insisting that Government bent over backwards to the combined opposition to get the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism Bill passed (AML/CFT).
He said that Government even made a request to incorporate the APNU amendments to the Bill should the opposition provide support for its passage.
However, support was not forthcoming and this caused Nandlall to contend that the opposition rejected their amendments.
A Partnership for National Unity (APNU) has since said, however, that it could not support what the government was proposing since it delinked the constitutional requirements that both APNU and the Alliance for Change (AFC) have been calling for before support can be given for the passage of the AML/CFT Bill.
The opposition party said that the assent by the President to the four local government election Bills and the setting up and running of the Public Procurement Commission (PPC) to monitor contracts are critical.
According to Nandlall, “In a last ditch effort, to have a legislation available, even one which runs the risk of being CFAFT (Caribbean Financial Action Task Force) non-compliant, before the FATF meeting in Paris, France, scheduled to take place on June 23, 2014, Government was prepared to cede to the opposition and agree to enact all their amendments which were proposed in the Special Select Committee.”
“We tried to do so, firstly, via the process of the Special Select Committee. Numerous efforts were made by the chairperson of the select committee, Gail Teixeira to convene a meeting of that committee before the June 19, 2014, sitting of the National Assembly.
“We have long e-mail exchanges between the chairperson and several members of the APNU who sit on the committee to prove these efforts.  Additionally, the President spoke to the Opposition Leader on the telephone requesting that he persuade his members on that committee to meet before the June 19 sitting of the National Assembly.  All those efforts failed,” the AG decried.
Nandlall added that when that didn’t work “the President invited the Leader of the Opposition to meet and they did meet at 5:00 p.m. on June 18, 2014.  I am informed that at that meeting, the President indicated to the Leader of the Opposition that Government is prepared to enact and that he will assent immediately to a Bill which contains the Opposition’s proposals, although,  those provisions may subsequently be adjudged to be CFATF non-compliant.  This offer was also rejected.”
According to Nandlall, APNU never wanted to support the AML/CFT in the first place; it was only about getting the four non-assented local government elections Bills passed. “It was an attempt to get the top prize, the non-assented Bills passed. Why? Because those Bills have one common thread running through them; which is, an unconstitutional and undemocratic hijacking of political power from the government to the Opposition in the National Assembly.”
Leader of APNU, Brig. David Granger, however, is contending that the government never wanted to have enforceable AMLCFT laws within the framework of governance and that is what CFATF and its head body the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) are calling for.
He said that the “last warning from the CFTAF came in 2011. That was even before the APNU was established, warning the government of Guyana to correct certain deficiencies by November 2013.
“The CFTAF was always concerned with the enforcement because we had some form of AML law on the books since 2000 but it was not enforced.”
Granger said, “Up to now there has not been a single prosecution for money laundering after 14 years so our concern has always been the institutions, particularly the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) and the new organization Special Organized Crime Unit (SOCU) that has not even been staffed,” according to the Head of the Presidential Secretariat Dr. Roger Luncheon.
According to Granger, only this week the government said that it will now accept the opposition amendments. “But the government was aware all the time that we had linked our approval to the passage of this Bill not only to legislation but also supporting the AFC with the Procurement commission and also that the President initiates a process by which the four Bills he had not assented to could be brought back.”
“When I met with the President on May 12, this was on the table and he agreed that the Attorney General would meet the Shadow Minister of Legal Affairs on the matter. When that meeting took place the AG did not proceed along the lines that had been proposed. He did not propose a process by which the Bills could be brought back to the National Assembly,” said Granger.
He said that his last meeting with the President ended the same way. “The President did not accept something that has been put on the table by APNU since last year so it is not a question of APNU disagreeing.
“It was always on the table; just that the government did not implement what we have been calling for.”
He said, further, that APNU is “willing to grant approval to the amended Bill once the President agrees to the process but they are not budging. I initiated meetings with the President twice during the month in order to break the deadlock.”
“The things we are calling for are constitutional; we are not asking for any waiver or favour we are asking for things that are outlined under the constitution,” said Granger.
Speaking to the imminent international blacklisting that might emanate from the FATF plenary, Granger said that “this is a risk that the government seems prepared to take because I do not believe the demands of APNU and AFC are so great, I don’t think we deserve the sanctions that are going to be imposed in light of what we have been calling for. I don’t think the country deserves that.”

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