I AM not in the least surprised that Azruddin Mohamed, kitted out with a teleprompter, tape measure and a pocket calculator, would attempt to conjure up a scandal over a farm belonging to President Irfaan Ali. For all his theatrics, the only skill Azruddin has convincingly displayed is a basic grasp of arithmetic.

In his so-called expose released a week ago, Azruddin is tall on accusations and short on evidence. He alleges corruption but has offered the citizens of Guyana zero evidence. Like Naipaul’s Mr Biswas gazing at other people’s houses, the apparent size of the president’s farm is enough to provoke Azruddin’s indignation. For a man who profited from decades of a gold-smuggling network inherited from his father, the Soesdyke farm at Long Creek, falsely measured by the clearance acreage, dares to scream corruption at the highest level of government.
If the president truly intended to siphon off a share of the country’s oil wealth for himself, Arya, and his sons, investing it in a farm along the Soesdyke highway would make him remarkably foolish. Where, precisely, is the profit in that? Nor is there any evidence to suggest that little Zayd’s fondness for rescuing animals means his future is in agriculture.
Farming is back-breaking work. It requires attention from dawn to dusk with little profit to show at the end of the harvest. Haven’t you noticed that the government has had to provide financial relief to rice farmers, sugar estates, and fisherfolks to the tune of billions of dollars a year?
If Azruddin were to tell me that the president’s farm sits on an aquifer the size of the Ogallala, he might get my attention. President Ali must know that Brazilian banks are foreclosing on a record-breaking number of farms, according to a recent Reuters report. Thousands of US farmers are walking away from their land, largely due to climate change, supply chain challenges and profitability.
Consider this: In every major speech over the last three years, President Ali has consistently emphasised food security. He reinforced that commitment in his 2025 book, Achieving Global Food Security: The Caribbean Experience and Beyond.
Kaieteur News, hardly a sympathetic voice, acknowledged that the book “offers new and credible insights on the Caribbean food security crisis.” Even the defunct Stabroek News published Dr Bertrand Ramcharan’s review, who said the book “deserves wide attention” and that it should inform CARICOM-wide discussion.
From where I sit, the farm fits squarely within the president’s vision and is proof of his passion for agriculture. It offers the country tangible evidence that, unlike so many political leaders, President Ali is willing to shoulder the risk that comes with a modern farm and lead from the front rather than simply instruct others to do so.
If we are to embrace Azruddin’s aggressive inquiry, where every asset, acre and head of cattle is to be itemised and interrogated, then consistency demands a wider lens.
On November 30, 2012, masked gunmen dressed as police officers raided the fishing boat “Summer Bliss” at the Willemstad port in Curaçao. The hijackers pistol-whipped its 51-year-old Guyanese captain and made off with 70 unmarked gold bars weighing 216 kg (476 lbs), valued at approximately US$13M.
The Curaçao authorities eventually arrested the bandits and retrieved the gold. The incident received widespread national and international media coverage and was dubbed the “Heist of Curaçao.”
So let us ask Azruddin and Nazar “Shell” Mohamed, plainly:
Were the 70 gold bars aboard the Summer Bliss the property of the Mohameds? No evasion, yes or no.
Guyanese authorities estimated that approximately GY$1 million in taxes was avoided when this single shipment of unmarked gold bars bypassed official channels. Citing an American dossier, the Curaçao Chronicle reported at the time that the shipment reflected 15 years of illicit gold cargo movement, often about the same or higher volume, that occurred weekly between Guyana and Curaçao.
It is entirely appropriate in any democracy to ask a sitting president to account for his assets. It is equally necessary that those making the loudest accusations account for their own financial histories, especially where they intersect with incidents of international concern.
That history is no longer confined to regional reporting or archival suspicion. United States authorities have now moved beyond inference to indictment, naming Nazar “Shell” and Azruddin Mohamed in connection with gold smuggling, sanctions evasion, and the movement of illicit proceeds through international financial systems.
The significance of legal action cannot situate what was once treated locally as rumour within a formal evidentiary framework tested by one of the most aggressive financial enforcement regimes in the world.
In that context, the questions surrounding Curaçao, unmarked gold, and long-running trade routes are not speculative diversions; they are part of a continuum now under active international scrutiny.
And no amount of chicanery by Azruddin and his sister will induce U.S. law enforcement to trade a live investigation into a gold smuggling operation for a manufactured scandal about a farm.
DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Guyana National Newspapers Limited.