Latest update January 1st, 2025 1:00 AM
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GRA finally brings an end to corruption in auction of vehicles
GRA Commissioner General, Godfrey Statia
The Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) has been successful in stamping out corruption when it comes to the auctioning of vehicles. According to GRA’s Commissioner General, Godfrey Statia, all vehicles are now auctioned by closed bids.
He told Kaieteur News that with the use of this process, the chances for collusion have been removed.
Statia said, “With the closed bids, nobody knows what the other is bidding. What you normally do is, you check to see the amount of taxes you would have lost on the vehicle.
Once the bid is lower than the taxes we lost, then we do not sell to the person…”
The Commissioner General said that more than 500 vehicles have been auctioned in the last year. He noted, too, that the bids are reviewed by an independent committee.
ONGOING FOR YEARS
For several years, the Guyana Revenue Authority has been battling schemes regarding ‘Want- Of-Entry’ vehicles and other imports. These are items brought in and left on the wharves for various reasons.
Several investigations by GRA often found that in some cases, persons wanting high-end vehicles that attract millions of dollars in duties and taxes would conspire with GRA staffers.
The vehicles are brought in and deliberately left on the wharves for a while until GRA announces an auction.
At the auction, the businessman would bid for the vehicle and normally wins because that bid would invariably be the highest. But that is where the trick is, officials explained.
The amount that was placed as a bid during those auctions are not what is eventually recorded in the books of GRA. A lower amount is entered and nobody is the wiser.
The GRA staffers would normally get a kickback and the businessman walks away paying a pittance for the vehicle.
In other cases, persons are alerted to high-value goods left uncleared on the wharves and same thing happens.
GRA would have auctioned scores of vehicles and other items it has been seizing or left on the wharves over time. The value of those taxes and duties if correctly collected would amount to tens of millions of dollars for the state.
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