– CEO says staff colluding with ‘powerful forces’

THE Guyana Lands and Surveys Commission (GLSC) will make a formal report to the Guyana Police Force (GPF) for an investigation to be launched into the leakage of unauthorised maps to Leader of the Opposition, Bharrat Jagdeo.
Jagdeo, at a press conference on Thursday, used the maps to make reference to persons, who lands were allocated to.

“There was evidence of the commission’s property being on display at a press conference yesterday (Thursday) without any record in the commission to show payments were made for those properties… this is clear evidence that our staff has been corrupted,” said Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the GLSC, Trevor Benn, during a press briefing on Friday.
Benn has since issued a call to the police to enquire how the documents got into the hands of Jagdeo, since there was no evidence that the documents were paid for at the GLSC.
He said it is against the commission’s Human Resources (HR) policy for staff of the commission to divulge personal information of clients. The commission has a system in place, which allows persons to access or have copies of documents if they visit the GLSC.
“No requests were made, I am not aware and none of my officers can attest to any request being made to us,” Benn lamented, adding that if someone receives property which they did not earn or did not formally receive, it can be described as stolen.

In that regard, he said there are clear attempts by “powerful forces” to corrupt staff of the GLSC to do such things. “Some of our staff members are known to be colluding with powerful forces, who intend to take control of all our land…this will not happen under my watch,” said Benn, adding that they know who the individuals are but, they will be dealt with in accordance with advice from the police.

Asked how he intends on ensuring that there is not another breach, Benn said there are policies in place and the GLSC’s HR department will be called upon to guard the policy more zealously.

As part of their efforts to improve monitoring, the commission will be digitising its records so that they will be able to track every time somebody accesses a file.
In 2016 the commission had no system in place for records, since much of the historical records were destroyed early in the life of the commission. A decision was taken by the then management to disband the registry and records unit.

“Our ability to administer land has been severely affected as a result…without records you cannot properly administer land…we are however taking steps to preserve all the commission’s records by digitising maps, plans, files and financial information,” said Benn.
Evident steps have been taken to improve the standard of the GLSC and as a result, the commission is seeing the bottlenecks that stand in the way of making the commission more accountable. “As we see them we are taking steps to change them…I therefore challenge anyone to come forward with evidence that will implicate me in any corrupt activities,” said Benn, adding that he can vouch for himself but not all of his staff.