THE FIRE OF HOPE IS BURNING AGAIN

May 20, 2018 AFC Column, Features / Columnists

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Supporters of the opposition People’s Progressive Party (PPP) are expected to do a lot more complaining in coming weeks/months as the Special Organized Crime Unit (SOCU) and the State Assets Recovery Agency (SARA) continue to collect evidence on the alleged unprecedented pillaging of our national assets between 1992 and 2015.
Many of the now Opposition party’s faithful have taken to social media and other outlets in recent days to complain that the Government, through SOCU and SARA, was systematically targeting the PPP’s leadership with “trumped up” criminal charges. They’ve called it a witch hunt and characteristically, managed to add a racist tint to SOCU’s investigations into their alleged wrongdoing. But none of this is new.
This most recent round of complaints was spawned by front page newspaper images of the former Finance Minister and NICIL boss being escorted into and out of the Victoria Law Courts. The pair have been indicted and charged with misconduct in public office, for allegedly disposing of prime seaside state lands well below market value to chosen buyers. The charges suggest that Millions in taxpayers’ funds have been forfeited or misappropriated.
Party leaders and members turned up to cry ‘racial and political victimization’ while the accused, as they made their way to the ground floor of the courthouse to post bail, voiced their denials to reporters, supporters and curious members of the public.
But in the middle of the next week, two very senior officials at SARA, Aubrey Heath-Retemyer and Eric Phillips, as guests on a radio show, said that the agency is doing everything within its power to recover several billions of dollars in unaccounted-for cash, vehicles, properties, state lands and other assets apparently misappropriated during the 23 years the PPP spent in office.
The man in the street was afraid long before 2015 that the day would never come when the PPP cabal would lose their grip on power and the machinery of state. By 2017, the search for the missing funds and assets was still moving too slowly to give John Q. Public much satisfaction, and s/he began to show signs of anticipation fatigue. S/he was beginning to lose hope that even some of their allegedly stolen patrimony would have been found and returned.
But today the fire of hope is burning again. We are now witnessing a high quality of forensic analysis and investigation into the activities of a former government that’s never before been seen in Guyana. Many had doubted that it could be done, and some people gave up hoping, but SOCU and SARA’s Forensic Accountants and ICT specialists kept at it, quietly unearthing billions of carefully hidden dollars and properties in foreign countries.
Both Heath-Retemyer and Phillips told the nation that SARA is working with international police and financial investigators to ferret out the hiding places and return those billions to Guyana’s treasury. To date, SARA has shortlisted more than 100 cases of ‘lost and found’ cash, property, bonds and other types of securities, and their domestic and international sleuths are building legal cases based on these finds.
By year’s end, the public will be apprised of the progress made with the first 10 of the most solvable cases. SARA said that they are more interested in recovering Guyana’s assets than putting the crooks behind bars. The task of jailing the guilty is a role for SOCU.
SARA believes that procurement fraud alone, pre- and post 2015 amounts to G$28 Billion annually. Smuggled gold across our borders is still pegged at about 15,000 ounces per week which is greater than the total amount of gold declared by large and small scale miners.
So when the former President denies that corruption was indeed endemic in his government, he leaves reasonable people wondering about his motives for denying the undeniable and his attempting to defend the indefensible. The PPP’s supporters must be very confused.
The best part is that many of the investigators involved in SOCU and SARA’s operations have no affiliation to Guyana’s past or its present. They are conducting their searches with objectivity.
It is apt to note that SARA was formally established in mid 2015 by this Government, but it was the PPP that had set up SOCU while in power. Reportedly, the main motive was to offer some assurance to the western world that it was going to ‘deal’ with corruption. It is ironic that this same agency is righteously going after those who would have transgressed the law. And basically, the very same people who were hired by the PPP are still in charge of SOCU.
Going forward, investigators have made it clear that there are about 30 additional cases involving the two gentlemen aforementioned. We will not forget any of the atrocities committed against citizens between 1997 and 2015. No one will forget the images of Mark Benschop in hand and foot shackles, or of former GDF major Bruce Munroe and wife, Carol Ann, along with businessman Junior Wharton who were all imprisoned, shackled and repeatedly brutalized on trumped up treason charges in 2010. And these were only a few of the dozens of cases of rank political discrimination.
But now that the shoe is on the other foot, the nation hears cries of political victimization and racism.

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