ASIDE from not remitting employees’ Union dues and National Insurance Schemes (NIS) deductions, the Georgetown Mayor and City Council (MCC) has also not been handing over its employees’ pension deductions, and is in arrears on its fire and motor insurance policies amounting to some $24 million in arrears.

As the Commission of Inquiry into City Hall continued on Friday, Ewart Adams, Deputy Managing Director of Insurance Brokers Guyana Limited (IBGL), MCC’s Insurance brokers, testified that the municipality has stopped remitting its employee pension deductions since March 2017. “We haven’t received pension monies [since] the month of February 2017.

The last payment received was February 2017 for $776,523, from March 2018 up to September 2018 it’s approximately $14.5 million owed,” Adams informed.

“We [IBGL] would handle the administrative pension plan, which is with GTM, the motor insurance is with GCIS and the fire insurance is between hand in hand and GTM. Payments are made by MCC to IBGL for onwards transmission to the respective insurance companies.

The fire and motor policies are every six months duration, and the pension plan is paid on a monthly basis.”

Of course this none payment will affect the innocent employees of the MCC.
“It is worrying to me, as well as the employees of MCC, because what it basically means is if someone retires from MCC, they will not receive their full pensions as would be refunded by GTM, due to the short payment by MCC, and the fact of the matter is; it is monies deducted from employees’ salaries on a monthly basis and not remitted. You have to ensure monies deducted from your employees’ salaries is utilised for what it was deducted for and not for any other purpose,” Adams asserted.

As it pertains to the fire and motor, MCC owes another $9.5 million.
“The council is in arrears for motor and fire to the sum of $9,566,304. This represents the period February 2017 for motor vehicle and December 2017 for fire,” Adams said.
Adams explained to the Commission being chaired by Justice (ret’d) Cecil Kennard, that as recent as a few days ago he has still been running to the MCC to have the situation rectified, however he is not meeting much success.

“It has not been rectified as recent as yesterday [Thursday], I was at City Council [on Thursday]. I have been making a concerted effort to have the monies paid by MCC. Ms. [Sharon] Harry, the Town Clerk who was acting, had promised to have these payments. She asked me to deal with Mr. Douglas, who is the acting City Treasurer. I went to see Mr. Douglas three weeks ago without any success, he advised his secretary for me to check with him the following week. On my return to city council to see Mr. Douglas I was asked to see Ms. Harry again,” Adams relayed, further conveying that:
“I have not been impressed, not by Mr. Douglas, Ms Harry did try to accommodate me and have the matter attended to but she is unable to.”