While reports of the imminent dismissal of Guyana Rice Development Board (GRDB) General Manager Nizam Hassan, who is before the courts, have begun to surface, Agriculture Minister Noel Holder on Wednesday said he was unaware of any decision to have Hassan sent home and had no intention of doing so.
When contacted on Wednesday, Minister Holder said he was not informed of any such decision. In fact, what he is aware of is the former Guyana Marketing Corporation (GMC) General Manager had applied for leave and was granted same.
Holder was also unsure about the decision to be taken by members of the GRDB, who were expected to meet on Wednesday to decide on the way forward.
Hassan and a female colleague, 34-year-old Felicia Desouza-Madramootoo, were on Monday slapped with fraud-related charges when they appeared before Chief Magistrate Ann McLennan at the Georgetown Magistrates’ Courts.
General Manager of GRDB Nizam HassanAgriculture Minister Noel Holder
The GRDB General Manager and his co-defendant are accused of being involved in a multimillion-dollar fraud.
The woman’s husband, Hanniel Madramootoo, a project engineer within the Agriculture Ministry; his brother, Philip and friend, Nizam Ramkisson, both Directors of Constantine Engineering and Construction Limited of Trinidad and Tobago, were also jointly charged.
Only Hassan and Desouza-Madramootoo appeared in court; arrest warrants have since been issued for the others who are said to currently be in Trinidad and Tobago
Hassan and Desouza-Madramootoo were charged with intent to defraud together along with three others by continuously approving payments for substandard and faulty works during the rehabilitation of the GMC building at Robb and Alexander Streets, Georgetown.
Hassan and his co-accused were not required to plead to the indictable charge, but were released on $250,000 bail each and have been ordered to report to the headquarters of the Special Organised Crime Unit every Friday.
The matter has been adjourned until December 7.
During the course of the audit into the operations of New GMC, it was found– based on the selection of three vouchers related to the construction of GMC’s office building for review – that incorrect building materials were used.
Additional auditing procedures were deemed necessary and a request was made to have all payment vouchers made available for further testing.
The Auditor said it was communicated by Owen Nestor, GMC’s accountant, that none of the other payment vouchers related to the construction of the office building could be found.
It was also communicated by Nestor that Hassan may have been the last person who had requested all of the construction-related payment vouchers. The auditors had recommended that a determination needed to be made as to what level of disciplinary action should be taken and the Board of Directors should instruct GMC’s management to make every effort to locate the missing vouchers.
The auditors, in reporting on his findings to the Finance Ministry, had complained that the process was “deliberately frustrated by the non-response and non-commitment extended by Mr Nizam Hassan, GMC’s General Manager and the lack of commitment by GMC’s accounting department’s staff”.
It was found that many vouchers and back-ups were not provided, either on a timely basis or not at all.
