Car dealer, Turkeyen business under probe for vehicles with false plates

Oct 01, 2017 News

over 40 high-end rides seized in past year

More than 40 vehicles believed to have been brought into country under the Remigrant Scheme and some suspected to have been smuggled were seized by the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) over the past year.

One of the vehicles seized this past week.

The disclosure would come even as the authority seized three vehicles last week. These were on the country without any paperwork showing up.
The three vehicles were linked a prominent business spot at Turkeyen. All had false plates, a GRA source disclosed over the weekend.
One of the vehicles seized is a Chevrolet HHR. Investigations are continuing with GRA looking to collect the millions of dollars in taxes and duties that are owed.
It is not the first time that the city dealer’s name has been called in the vehicle scam. Vehicles are brought into the country with the importer using mainly persons living in the US.
The Guyanese, who would have been living overseas for years, would be paid a fee to apply for a remigrant status.
This application states that the remigrant is desirous of returning home and wants to bring his or her possessions back. Once granted, the possessions would be allowed to land without attracting the necessary duties.
However, a number of smart persons, aided with a lax monitoring system at GRA in the past, capitalized on the weaknesses of the Remigrant Scheme.
After applying, being granted approval and bringing the vehicles into Guyana, the ‘remigrant’ would promptly hand it over to the ‘real’ owner, stick around for a few mornings and return to his home overseas.
Under the Remigrant Scheme arrangement, GRA was supposed to monitor the applicants to ensure that they are really living in Guyana. Being out of a jurisdiction for longer than is being spent in Guyana would mean that the arrangements have been breached.
In that case, the necessary taxes and royalties would kick in if breaches to the remigrant arrangements can be established.
Prior to last year, GRA appeared not too keen to monitor. It is estimated that hundreds of high end vehicles from Toyota Prado and Land Cruisers, Lexus, Land Rovers, Mercedes, BMW and Infiniti, came in under fraudulent arrangements using the Remigrant Scheme.
As a result, billions of dollars in taxes and royalties were lost to the coffers of Guyana.
However, the crackdown, which began under the new Commissioner-General, Godfrey Statia, last year, has seen more than 40 vehicles being seized.
The owners, facing prosecution and other punishments, have largely opted to settle rather than walk the steps of the courts.
At least one city car dealer has been repeatedly named as using the Remigrant Scheme, and pocketing tens of millions of dollars in profits under the table.

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