Dear Editor,
THE US Government has reportedly made a plea deal offer to the sanctioned businessman Nazar ‘Shell’ Mohamed for his role in gold smuggling and other illicit activities. Of interest to me is the demand for a payment of a 65 million USD fine in addition to jail time.
The US is clearly going after its ‘pound of flesh’ and one must ask if/when the state of Guyana will do the same, for we are the party who were defrauded by the criminal enterprise run by the Mohamed duo.
The US government provided five years of data to show the Mohameds defrauded the government of over 50 million USD but more importantly they showed us the blueprint of the smuggling enterprise and we are able to go back further using declared exports at Guyana ports and import declarations at foreign ports; the 50 million USD is but the tip of the iceberg.
Armed with this information and foregoing consideration of the plethora of other criminal transgressions, the Government of Guyana must end its sloth in pursuit of prosecution of the duo (political cover notwithstanding) and, act to secure a first lien on all of the assets owned and controlled by Azruddin and Shell Mohamed before the United States gets the corn and we are left holding the husk.
Faithfully,
Robin Singh