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Ashni, Brassington hauled in, grilled on more suspicious land deals

May 10, 2018 News

A day following their dramatic appearance in the Magistrates Court on charges of misconduct in public office, former Government officials, Dr. Ashni Singh and Winston Brassington spent several hours with investigators of the Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU) yesterday.

Investigators questioned the former Government officials at SOCU’s headquarters on Camp Road in relation to over 20 land deals executed under the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) administration.

Accompanying the former officials were Attorneys-at-Law
Anil Nandlall, Sase Gunraj [former Attorney General] and Mark Waldron.

According to Nandlall, they were shown a series of transactions dating back to the 90s under the same rubric of misconduct in public office.

He explained that the land deals include the sale of properties at Bel Air Gardens to Ian McDonald and another to Guyana Stockfeeds, among others.

“My view is that there is absolutely no criminality involved; no allegation is made that any money is missing. No dishonesty is being alleged. All that is being alleged is that these properties were not sold at valuation price that is in the file. I don’t know since when this valuation officer or his valuation certificate is immutable and is something handed down from heaven that any sale that contradicts that becomes unlawful,” Nandlall stated.

The attorney stated that as far as instructions go, the sales were advertised by public tender and they were sold at a price generated by the market.

Nandlall indicated that he drew the attention of investigators to the issue of the purchasers of the lands not being investigated. He said he was told by the investigators that they were instructed to focus on the two former officers.

“The question has to be asked as a lawyer why are the persons who benefited from this alleged criminality not being investigated. The purchasers of the property provided that these sales are criminal as the state is suggesting they are participants in the criminality and therefore I don’t know if the investigators will see it fit to investigate and charge all those people,” Nandlall stated.

Dr. Singh, a former Finance Minister and Brassington, the former head of National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited (NICIL), were placed on $6M bail when they appeared in court on Tuesday charged with three counts of misconduct in public office.

The two men were not required to plead to the indictable charges that stem from the sale of land along the East Coast of Demerara at
at Plantation Liliendaal, Pattensen and Turkeyen.

Nandlall explained that based on the pile of files that he saw at SOCU the two will require several more millions of dollars in bail alone.

He said based on research, the maximum punishment for charge of misconduct in public office is imprisonment for one year.

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