ATTORNEY General and Minister of Legal Affairs Anil Nandlall S.C. has defended the decision of the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) to withdraw income tax charges against U.S.-indicted Azruddin Mohamed and his father, Nazar Mohamed, stating that imprisonment is no substitute for tax recovery.
The minister made these remarks during a televised interview with the state media on Friday, where he discussed GRA’s move to withdraw tax evasion charges, noting that the extradition of the father-and-son duo should not be jeopardised for that purpose. The withdrawal of the charges clears the way for the Mohameds to be extradited to the U.S.
According to the complaints, Nazar and Azruddin are accused of understating billions of dollars in taxable income from gold exports between 2019 and 2023 — an alleged total of $34 billion in underreported income.
In a letter to Nazar and Azruddin, GRA stated that the unpaid taxes continue to attract interest under the Financial Administration and Audit Act and the Income Tax Act.
Emphasising that the charges were not politically motivated, the Attorney General said: “As I said, before, these charges have a date that they span from 2017 to 2024. On the documents themselves, they say that the investigation began since 2010. The two subjects of the extradition requests were not politicians when these things happened. The offences that are charged are not political in nature, in any form or fashion.”
Nandlall countered the narrative and stated that any politicisation originated with the subjects themselves – the Mohameds.
“It is after the sanctions came from the United States government and after it was clear that extradition requests were to follow, one of the subjects entered politics. It is he who made it political, and now he puts up politics as a shield. He made a conscious decision to get into politics, knowing that this was coming.”
Nandlall noted that the pursuance of the more than $191 billion in taxes by the Mohameds will be recovered through civil litigation.
“Its national interest is the only super riding power over a state’s ability to collect taxes. Taxes are the lifeblood of a state, and every single country in the world has a panoply of powers to get taxes, so the state of Guyana has a repertoire of remedies available to ensure that taxes that are outstanding are paid through various legal processes. One doesn’t have to jeopardise an extradition process to get that, and from all indications, the state will move in that direction,” Nandlall said.
Vice-President Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo, on Thursday, during a press conference, said the state still intends to recover the monies owed by the Mohameds.
“So, the withdrawal of the criminal aspect of it doesn’t preclude you from going after the money – the owed taxes – in a civil court. The civil remedy for the taxes [owed] is already being pursued. They got the demand notice for the $191 billion already. That’s calculated based on the penalties; that’s not going to stop.”
The GRA filed the charges following what it said was a comprehensive audit into Mohamed’s Enterprise’s gold export records. The GRA had accused the men of deliberately failing to disclose the full earnings, resulting in a significant loss of tax revenue to the State.
In the meantime, the government has pledged to intensify efforts to recover the taxes owed by the businessmen.