says audit needs to be done

THIRD-TERM Councillor and newly-elected Mayor of Georgetown, Alfred Mentore, has announced that he is unsure of City Hall’s financial status, and has committed to having an audit of the organisation.

The Mayor, during the City Council’s first statutory meeting since the election of new councillors, blamed his predecessors, majority of whom were from the People’s National Congress-Reform (PNC-R), for the current, questionable financial status.

“I am not going to take blame,” Mentore said, adding: “We don’t want to be taking blame for some previous councillors.”
Claiming that it is an administrative duty to ensure City Hall’s financials are in order, Mentore maintained that he will not take blame for the local organ’s position.

He related that the Council is ready and willing to outsource the necessary expertise to audit City Hall.
“We want a full audit of this place, we want a full understanding of what is going on…,” Mentore said.

Earlier this year, Vice-President, Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo, had accused City Hall of a number of corrupt practices and according to him, there is consideration to have the audits ordered by central government.

“Through the ministry, we can direct the audit and we will do so,” the Vice-President said.

He acknowledged too that there are still remaining concerns over the selling and leasing of lands in the capital city through the City Council, which is controlled by APNU/PNC-R.
There has also been reported cases of obscure transactions involving the writing off or wavering of taxes to businesses arbitrarily without proper records of how amounts are arrived at or how the agreement came about.

“I am concerned about Georgetown too. Georgetown is another place where I know for sure and I raised this on the campaign trail, that there are some individuals who have been identifying plots of land owned by the city and going by private businessmen to get them sold or give them leases in exchange for payment on the side.
“Unfortunately, some of those same individuals are backed by APNU on the City Council. APNU have a way of spinning things, you have to admire them for telling the big lies and stick with them,” Dr. Jagdeo said.

In 2018, during a Commission of Inquiry (COI) into City Hall it was exposed that the Council had leased a land on Lombard Street referred to as the “Sussex Street Wharf,” despite not having ownership of the land.

After the businessman spent considerable money developing the area, and paying the lease, he was later approached by two other entities that claimed ownership of the property. It remains unknown how that issue was resolved.

That very COI also unearthed cases where businesses were given tax waivers by the then Town Clerk, but was later told to pay over millions to the Council.