Too early to confirm, rule out any agency’s culpability –  Sattaur
– Calls for proper, detailed investigation
COMMISSIONER General of the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) Mr. Khurshid Sattaur says it is too early to confirm or rule out any agency in the ‘cocaine in lumber container’ nabbed in Jamaica last week Wednesday, and called for a proper and detailed investigation encompassing all agencies involved.

He made the call in a press release sent to media houses yesterday. The GRA boss said recent suggestions that officers of the Customs and Trade Administration (CTA) of the GRA may be implicated in the cocaine find “are at best premature since preliminary investigations conducted separately by the GRA and the Guyana Forestry Commission (GFC) point to several discrepancies in the way the shipment of the logs was handled at different times by different agencies.”

The release quotes the Commissioner-General thus:  “… the logs and the containers were handled by several persons and agencies starting with the exporters and ultimately ending with the shippers. A breach could have taken place at any point in that chain and only a detailed investigation would identify at what point the cocaine was placed in the container.”
“While the GRA is satisfied at this point that the CTA officers followed the documented Standard Operating Procedures (SOP), it is too early to lay the blame at any particular officer or agency but no one could be ruled out either,” he said.

Sattaur also confirmed that the ship that was originally supposed to be the carrier of the consignment of lumber was changed without knowledge of the GRA.

On Wednesday last,  at Port Bustamante in Kingston Jamaica, Jamaica Customs seized 122.65 kilogrammes of cocaine with a street value of Gy$700 million.

According to the Jamaica Observer, the Jamaica Customs seized the narcotics cache after a routine examination of the transhipment vessel, the Vega Azurit. The Jamaica Customs said, in a statement last Wednesday, that no arrests had been made so far in relation to the find. However, according to the Observer, the Customs authorities said a determination was made that the drugs were indeed destined for Jamaica.

The Observer report said the packages were handed over to the Transnational Crime and Narcotics Division of the Jamaica Constabulary Force for further examination and investigation.

The release said GRA is very concerned over the Stabroek News headline of Friday, 18th March, and story carried in that same edition of the newspaper. The agency expressed concern that the story and headline appear to have caused “some amount of alarm to the GFC, and regrets the implication that the GRA is now blaming the GFC for the container with the cocaine being on board the ship.”

Commenting yesterday on the imbroglio, Minister of Home Affairs Clement Rohee said the mere fact that the shipment passed undetected gives Guyana a bad name.

“It shows that people are trying to get the drugs out by all means,” the Home Affairs Minister said. However, he noted that the investigations must be allowed to be completed before further decisive action is considered.

He also declined to pronounce on whether this episode is good enough grounds for placing Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) officers at wharves, from where they were removed some time ago.

Rohee added that there must be more inter-agency cooperation in the drug fight and said it matters little that the various agencies and actors are shifting the responsibility for the drugs being shipped.

According to the GRA, the Commissioner General, speaking earlier this week, established that “the GFC was the agency responsible for ‘clearing’ forestry products for shipping while the CTA was responsible for ‘processing’ the declaration.”

He explained that this clearance by the GFC involves, among other things, the issuance of Export Certification, Timber Marketing Certification, and the stamping of the Customs Declaration form (C72) and related documents.

“After the GFC issues the ‘clearance’, the CTA then processes the declaration,” the GRA stated.

“l would like to categorically state that it was never my intention to blame anyone or any agency for this heinous act but, as indicated to reporters who called me on the matter, my intention is to get to the bottom of the incident and, at the appropriate time, take such action on the perpetrators if it is found that GRA officers were involved,” the GRA quotes Sattaur as saying yesterday.

Sattaur said, on Friday last, that “Everyone is jumping and blaming the GRA without ascertaining the facts. There are many entities involved in the shipping: the agents, the GFC, the wharf…many actors.”

According to Sattaur, the GRA has its hands full and cannot possibly examine every container. “We do risk profiling to determine whose container is examined…from all indications the GRA did its work,” he said. “We are satisfied that we followed procedure.”

This newspaper sought comments from the management of John Fernandes Limited, the port facility at which the ship docked during its visit to Guyana. However, these requests were denied and this newspaper was instead redirected to agent of the vessel, C&V Shipping. This company also refused to comment when approached by this newspaper. The Chronicle was also unable to garner a comment from the Commissioner (acting) at the Guyana Forestry Commission.