‘Don’t weep for me, weep for Guyana’

Oct 16, 2022 News

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– Glenn Lall says theft by Politicians, foreigners trump millions stolen from his company by bandits

Kaieteur News – Bandits last week stormed the Kaieteur News Saffon Street, Charlestown, Georgetown office and escaped with millions in cash and other items, but Publisher of the newspaper, Glenn Lall said though he is concerned about the daring robbery, he sees billions of this country’s wealth being stolen by Politicians with little resistance from citizens – a situation which he said must not be allowed to continue.

Lall made the comments on the Wednesday night edition of the ‘Glenn Lall Show’ during which he gave a summary of the robbery, which was planned and executed by a former employee and a guard of the company. Over $14M was stolen when the bandits carted off a safe from the company. Thus far police have rounded up all the players involved in the robbery.

“This criminal act that these criminals committed here at the Kaieteur News on Monday morning may seem to many of you out there as a horrible crime, that no one should have to encounter in any country, and I fully agree with such a stance. Crime of any nature – be it a snatching or a break-in are all crimes that make people feel uncomfortable.  No one likes to lose anything small much less something that large. But I want to say something tonight to all of you, using that criminal incident, that loss, that crime committed on this company, it did not hurt me as much as the gigantic crimes that are being committed daily in this country, right under the nose of all of us,” Mr. Lall told his radio and internet audience. He continued, “I told a couple reporters when they came to me for a comment on the robbery incident that I haven’t seen you guys in a long time but as soon as a crime of this nature occurs, you guys are on the ball. I said to them if I am to compare what happened here versus the crimes that are being committed by the Political elites in this country, then what took place here is tiny, it’s nothing,” Mr. Lall added.

He said the real criminal activities by real criminals “are being plotted behind closed doors in air- conditioned rooms, with plenty of armed guards, with sophisticated security systems not at bottom houses like the Kaieteur criminals did.”

“The crime committed by the KN ex-staff members thankfully did not take any lives and what was stolen is known and can be recovered, but what the real criminals in this country doing is destroying hopes and lives and stealing unknown amounts of wealth that can never be recovered.  I told the reporters I don’t hear you guys talking about this type of criminality and no one coming for a comment from Glenn Lall about this.  This is the type of criminal activities involving the massive financial crimes that we all should be talking about.”

Mr. Lall said the crime committed against him and his company and the employees, “if I am to measure the hurt from this crime that was committed here versus the horrible crimes that are being committed by the Politicians with these foreigners, and had to measure it by 100 percent, what happened at Kaieteur News is one percent and 99 percent is on what is happening in our country with our resources.”

He told his audience that just like how the bandits burned the fake number plates, burned their clothes and threw away the safe to cover their tracks, it is even worse with Guyana’s politicians. “How they are hiding these contracts from us, trying to cover their tracks as to the criminal activities they did.”

To this end, Mr. Lall asked what is more criminal, “three men fetching out a safe or three politicians joining with foreigners to rob the entire nation of billions?”

“Again, I am saying it, every blade of grass in this country, every ounce of gold, every drop of oil belongs to every one of us, not President Ali, not Jagdeo, not Norton, not Ramjattan and certainly not to any foreigner, it belongs to all of us – you and me and even to the unborn Guyanese.”

He said no one is asking President Irfaan Ali to see the mining contracts “which will show how the foreign investors, without a gun in their hands, robbing all of us blind of our own wealth.  On to now the mining contracts that Jagdeo promised a month ago, can’t see the light of the day yet. The whole country is talking about Kaieteur News robbery on social media and in all the media houses – which is a good thing in a terrible situation. The newspaper put six of the alleged robbers photographs big and bold on the front page and all the papers sold out everywhere in Georgetown. But every day when we have big, bold, screaming headlines about the real skullduggery, real banditry, real crimes and the real bandits’ photographs, the paper don’t sell out so quickly,” Lall commented.

Gas-to-shore project  

Turning his attention to the gas-to-energy project, Mr. Lall asked what can be a more bigger crime than that? “A US$2B project that only one man (Jagdeo) is saying good for Guyana, without any financial studies to back-up what he is telling us. If this is not a horrible crime, one million times worse than them who came in and take away my safe, then we don’t have crime in this land.  US$2B coming out of your oil now, while some of you starving, some of you taking home a salary that can’t even pay your rent alone, to finance this project, all in the name of bringing cheap electricity to one portion of Guyana, when less than US$300M, 1/6 of that US$2B can give all of Guyana cheaper, cleaner and dependable electricity.  Again if this is not a crime, then what is?

Mr. Lall has used his newspaper and other media outlets over the past several years to wage a war on corruption in Government. He has also given serious attention to the nascent oil and gas industry, pushing for a better oil contract with ExxonMobil and for full liability coverage in the event of an oil spill.

According to the United Nations, every year, an estimated US$1 trillion is paid in bribes and US$2.6 trillion is stolen through corruption. Together, this sum represents five percent of annual global GDP. Further, in developing countries, funds lost to corruption are estimated to be 10 times the amount of the overall Official Development Assistance. Public procurement accounts for a significant amount of government spending, with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) estimated that countries spend an average of 13-20 percent of their GDPs on procurement. The OECD Foreign Bribery Report of 2014 shows that more than half of foreign bribery cases occurred to obtain a public procurement contract.  The direct costs of corruption include loss of public funds through misallocations or higher expenses and lower quality of goods, services, and works (OECD, 2015a). Those paying the bribes seek to recover their money by inflating prices, billing for work not performed, failing to meet contract standards, reducing quality of work or using inferior materials, in case of public procurement of works. This results in exaggerated costs and a decrease in quality. A study by the OECD and the World Bank shows that corruption in the infrastructure and extractives sectors lead to misallocation of public funds and substandard and insufficient services (OECD, 2015a).

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