BY no stretch of the imagination can considerations of the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism Act (AML/CFT) by the Parliamentary Special Select Committee (PSSC) be completed by the next sitting of the National Assembly on July 18.

In fact, the Select Committee is merely at the stage of addressing submissions that have been invited from the public and other entities, Secretary to the Cabinet, Dr. Roger Luncheon informed yesterday.
“So there is no way that July 18 could see anything close to a report on the AML/CFT Amendment Act,” Dr. Luncheon said at his post-Cabinet press briefing at the Office of the President in Georgetown.
Government has noted that the involvement of the Opposition in the PSSC has been infrequently scheduled and meetings have dealt with a minimum agenda, all in an effort to delay enactment of amendments to the act.
Legal Affairs Minister and Attorney General, Anil Nandlall recently accused the Opposition of deliberately attempting to dilate and detain the process involved in effecting amendments to the bill before August 26.
At a recent press conference, he had expressed his hope that the Opposition would be persuaded about the importance of this bill, and not subject it to political games.
Meanwhile, should amendments to the AML/CFT fail to be enacted by this time, Guyana could end up being listed with other delinquent countries, and would be visited with a regime of sanctions, which would include restrictions in the manner of conducting business internationally, especially where wire transfers of funds are concerned.
Once placed on that list of delinquents, Guyana could languish there for an average of about seven years before being taken off, during which time the country would have to undergo stringent scrutiny on procedures used in transacting business across borders.
Guyana was given a timeline to effect the passage of the amendments before May 27, but this was not done. The bill subsequently remained in Parliament.
The Financial Action Task Force (FATF), a global watchdog against financial crimes, met in Nicaragua from May 27-30 last with the intention to examine how Guyana and other countries in the Caribbean are meeting international obligations, and it was there that the country was granted a November extension.
However, officials later learned that the amendments must be enacted by August 26 before the bill could be considered in November.
But according to Nandlall, the Opposition has since adopted a “go slow” approach to working on the bill. Moreover, the Opposition is not prepared to meet frequently and would see only one member of the public per day, when more can obviously be seen.
Explaining why the government chose to bring the bill to the National Assembly at the last minute, the Attorney General said Guyana was under assessment for a year and a half, and the recommendations in legislative form did not come all at the same time, but instead over a period of time.
“The last set of recommendations came to us as late as early March of 2013. We thought a better course was to capture all the amendments in a singular compendium and present them for passage in the National Assembly, and that is what this amendment seeks to do,” he explained.