SARU keeps watchful eye on Sanata Complex well deal

Sep 14, 2016 News

Troubled by the makings of the deal, the State Asset Recovery Unit (SARU) says that without a doubt,

SARU Head,
Dr. Clive Thomas

it is now “keeping a watchful eye” on the controversial situation involving a well that is located in the Sanata Textile Complex in Ruimveldt.
This was confirmed by Head of the Unit, Dr. Clive Thomas.
Thomas said, “I find it alarming that a public well can be sold as part of a deal to a private citizen. I can understand if the well is being leased but I just can’t wrap my head around the idea that Ramroop was gifted this state asset as part of some deal with the former regime. So we are definitely keeping an eye on this matter. It is marked on our list.”
For more than three decades, it was under the control of Government. Then in the late 2000s, a water well at the Sanata Textile Complex, Ruimveldt, was sold under questionable circumstances by the National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited (NICIL) to Queens Atlantic Investments Inc. (QAII), a group of companies under the direction of Dr. Ranjisinghi ‘Bobby’ Ramroop.
Why the administration of former President Bharrat Jagdeo decided to sell the well which was managed by the Guyana Water Inc. (GWI) is now the big question. Jagdeo is a close friend of Ramroop.
While the well was located in the Sanata complex, it served and continues to serve over 9,000 customers in the Ruimveldt area, including D’Aguiar Park, Alexander Village, Meadowbank and West Ruimveldt.
Each month, GWI has been paying almost $3M in electricity bills for the well as well as sending its technicians daily. Its technicians access the well through QAII security.
The ownership of the well came up recently when technicians attempted to conduct checks of water

Dr. Ranjisinghi
‘Bobby’ Ramroop

connection at the QAII at the Ruimveldt facility, but were later asked by management of the water company to suspend all investigations until further notice.
The complex houses a newspaper, radio and storage bond, as well as administration offices of QAII.
QAII claimed that the visits by technicians were in retaliation to a report carried in a newspaper it owned that GWI’s Managing Director, Dr. Richard Van-West Charles, benefitted from a fuel import and storage licence.
Dr. Van-West Charles later admitted that he told the technicians to stand down after he was requested to do so by Chairman of the GWI Board, Mr Nigel Hinds.
Hinds, when asked, said that ownership of the well was in question and GWI needed to probe this. The Chairman said he would be releasing the findings of the probe.
In the meantime, GWI in a statement to the press said that Dr. Ramroop indicated that he had bought the entire complex which included the well but “inherited the daily checks of the well by GWI.”
He assured GWI that he would not interfere with this arrangement.

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